


The Winds of Loss and Change

by Gyhl



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 3, Fallout 4, Kingsman (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Child Abuse, Dark, Drug Addiction, Drug Use, Eggsy's life sucks, Forced Prostitution, Forced child drug use, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Multi, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Pain, Rape/Non-con Elements, Slavery, Torture, Underage Drug Use, Underage Prostitution, but it'll get better, but that might change, fic. fic never changes, idk yet, nothing underage is explicit, ships are where I'm planning to go, slight altering of a Fallout 4 canon event
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-10-04
Packaged: 2019-06-23 16:47:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 7
Words: 47,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15610632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gyhl/pseuds/Gyhl
Summary: War. War never changes.In the year 2290, a settlement in the northern part of the Commonwealth - Outpost Zimonja - was attacked by raiders. They were after children, and they managed to make off with one young boy by the name of Gary Unwin. Gary was sold progressively farther west and south, until - three years later - he was bought by the slavers of Paradise Falls in the Capital Wasteland.By 2305, Zimonja has become a major stop for the Railroad smuggling synths north into New Hampsha and Main. Tensions with the remnants of the Institute are reaching a boiling point, with both sides poised to resume open hostilities.Because war. War never changes.In the middle of it all, a 25 year-old slave named Eggsy, assumed to be a synth, arrives in Bunker Hill. Now the newly minted agent Gawain, of the Railroad's Kingsman cell, heads to Bunker Hill to find, and hopefully save, this possible lost soul. At the same time, a courser, one of the elite and deadly assassins of the Institute, is sent to retrieve, or eliminate, the synth.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I challenged my wife, KoohiiCafe, to a Kingsman/Fallout fic duel. This is the start of the result.

01

It happened in the middle of the night. Lee heard the turrets start firing and he was up like a shot. He had a wife and two children to protect; Gary, who was ten, and Daisy, who was two. Their settlement was a good one. It had sturdy walls, plenty of water and food, and had grown to a good number of people. There was a radio tower in the center of their little town and it had become a stop for a caravan going to the Castle east of Boston proper, and one that made the trip up into New Hampsha and Main.

It made them a tempting target for raiders. He knew Harry and the others would have been moving as soon as he had. In the lit pathways of Zimonja, the raiders were easy to spot. They were a small group, maybe only fifteen in all. It was good, really, that it wasn’t a larger group. Most of their people were untrained civilians. They could take care of this without them.

He heard Harry’s voice over the din.

“No quarter, no mercy!”

Lee knew from experience that this was his leader bluffing. If they ran, they wouldn’t be followed. If they surrendered, Harry would offer them the chance to join their community or exile. Those who chose the former were allowed in and carefully monitored for a year. If they chose the later, they were branded and warned that they would be killed if seen near the settlement again.

They had downed the last of the raiders when they heard a scream from the homes. Lee knew instantly that it was his wife.

“Michelle!” he screamed, running toward their home without thought.

James followed him, quickly matching Lee’s pace. They found the door standing wide and Lee ran into the room, gun at the ready just in case there was a raider still in the house. James went back-to-back with him and they surveyed the house.

They parted, James searching his side, Lee searching his side. James had just stepped into the kitchen when he heard Lee wail Michelle’s name. James rushed to his side, and saw him cradling Michelle. He didn’t need to see her face to know she was dead. There was blood all over her. Some raider had gotten at her with a machete from the look of it.

_Fuck._

He went into the other bedroom. Gary’s bed and Daisy’s crib were empty. He rushed back to the other room.

“They’ve got the kids.”

Lee looked up at him from Michelle’s body. “I’ll kill them.”

The ran out of the house and to the wall, looking for how their defenses were breached. They found where a hole had been cut in the fence and they went through it. It was hard to track them in the dark, and they listened for anything.

“That way,” Lee snapped. He’d heard his baby crying. 

They ran toward Daisy’s wailing. They got close enough to just make the raiders out in the moonlight and starlight. Two shots rang out; one blowing the head off of one raider, and one blowing out the knee of the other.

Lee went over to him, gun still drawn. “My baby,” he snapped.

The raider held her out and let him take her. “Please! It was just a job! We were hired to hit you!”

“By _whom_?”

The raider shrugged. “I don’t know! He said to bring back kids! That’s all we was after, man!”

“And who… cut… my wife’s throat?”

“That was him, man!” He pointed to his dead friend. “I just grabbed the girl, I swear!”

“Well,” he shifted Daisy in his arms. “You heard our leader. No mercy.”

He fired once more, blowing the raider’s head off. He holstered his weapon and wiped the blood from his child’s face. Was it from the raiders? From her mother? He didn’t know.

“Daddy’s here, baby. Daddy’s here.” He looked at James. “We have to find Gary. We have t-”

A shot rang out, and suddenly there was a hole in Lee’s throat. Daisy was quickly soaked by her father’s blood and James barely had time to grab her before he collapsed. He covered her with his body and ran back toward Zimonja. He heard shots behind him, but he escaped unscathed.

“Harry!” he called when he saw his leader. “Did anyone find Gary?”

Harry froze. “We didn’t realize he was missing.”

And then Harry was barking orders. Alistair climbed up the radio tower to a crow’s nest they’d built. He looked through his scope, the night vision coloring the world green. He did a slow, thorough sweep.

“Gone,” he yelled down to Harry.

Gone. James’ arms tightened around Daisy. _He said to bring the kids back_. His mind jumped to the Institute. They were the great boogeyman of the Commonwealth. Anytime anyone disappeared, the Institute was blamed. And sometimes it _was_ them. Sometimes they even sent people back; synthetic people who could pass perfectly for humans. A few years ago, a Vault Dweller nicknamed the General had blown up most of the Institute. But like radroaches, some had survived the nuclear explosion and regrouped. And no one was quite certain where.

But he’d never heard of the Institute hiring raiders, not even before the explosion that obliterated the ruins of the Commonwealth Institute of Technology, the old university the Institute had set up shop beneath. Slavers tended to stay away from the Commonwealth, and they weren’t usually so picky as going just after the kids.

He shook his head. He didn’t have the mind to think about it right now. He’d just lost two of his closest friends, and their son to boot. He took Daisy back home and got her cleaned up. He got her into something clean and put her down in her crib. He didn’t want to leave her alone and lay down on Gary’s bed. 

In the morning, James and Alistair went out to find Lee’s body. It had been picked at by animals, but it was otherwise fine. They picked him up, and carried him back to Zimonja. Harry and Hamish had been digging all morning. They put Michelle and Lee side-by-side and marked their grave with a single marker. One of the women found a hubflower bush and planted it at the foot of the grave.

Afterward, the four Kingsmen met in the warehouse. Harry had brought a bottle of whisky that had been brought over to America before the war. The tradition had been to have a drink when one of them fell, and the bottle was almost empty. 

“To Gawain,” Harry said.

They raised their glasses and repeated the intonation before they all drank.

“We’ll need to replace him,” Harry said after a moment of silence. “I’ll contact Desdemona and see if she has anyone she’d like to station with us. If not… we’ll need to pick from our civilian population.”

“What about Gary?” James asked.

“I have our provisioner asking when they can. I’ve sent a couple people to Bunker Hill to ask around.” Harry looked at his men. “Merlin, Percival. I want the two of you to try and follow the raiders’ backtrail. See if you can find Gary.”

“I should-”

“No,” Harry said, cutting off James. “I understand why you want to, but that’s precisely why I am not allowing it. There are too few of us left for you to go off half-cocked.”

James looked less than pleased but he accepted Harry’s decision. “I’ll go keep an eye on Daisy then,” he said and he left.

“I know it sounds callous,” Merlin said, “but I almost hope he’s dead. If we don’t find him…”

Harry nodded. “God only knows what they’ll do to him. I’ll stay with Lancelot. If you don’t find anything by dusk, get back here. No sense losing another Knight.”

They found no sign that day. Or the next. After a week, they stopped searching, but they kept looking for sign of him. After a year, the accepted that they weren’t going to find him. They could only hope that someday, somewhere they would find some trace of him.

The four of them took care of Daisy, making sure she was safe, making sure she wanted for nothing. They couldn’t change what had happened in one night, but they could keep her safe enough.

02

He was a feisty little fucker, the radiers gave him that much. They’d tried to tie him up; he’d kicked one of them in the balls and bitten the other two. One of those two punched him in the head, hard enough that they all heard the _thunk_. The boy’s eyes dazed and he went down.

“Tie that fuck up,” he snarled, looking at the bite. “You think the little fuck’s rabid?”

“Oh, sure,” said the other one Gary had bitten as he tied up the still squirming mass. “Saw him foaming at the mouth and everything.”

“Fuck you, Nails.”

“Eat my ass, A.K.”

“Next time we get hired to raid a settlement,” the third one said as he got back to his feet, “let’s make sure none of those fuckers are around.”

A.K. sighed and held the brat’s legs so Nails could finish hogtying him. “If it ain’t people like that, it’s that fuck Garvey and the fucking Minutemen.”

“Jared shoulda killed that fuck before they got back on their feet.” Nails had gotten another bit of rope and was tying a sizable knot in it. “Things were nice before he got that General fuck.”

A.K. forced Gary’s mouth open so Nails could push the knot in. He tied it around the kid’s head. The kid could still scream and yell at them, but it would be muffled. Nails backed away from him and then kicked him in the side, as hard as he could. It got him a satisfying _crack_ and the boy screamed behind the knot.

“You carry him first, Harp. I do it, I’m gonna kill him.”

The third raider picked him up, slipping his arms through the space between the kid’s arms and back. The little fuck was still trying to kick and scream. He had spirit at least.

“Keep an eye out for deathclaws,” he said. “One comes, I’m dropping the fucker. Dead men don’t spend caps.”

Deathclaws were so named because they were claws and death. Their claws were as long as a man’s arm. They had horns just as long and spines along their back. They were a lizard of some kind, although they only knew rumors about how they’d gotten started. Some kinda forced mutations on a chameleon, or some shit like that.

“Fucking shit, Harp, if we run into one _now_ , I’ll blow your fucking head off,” A.K. threatened.

“They ain’t ghosts, cum-wad. They don’t just show up when you fucking mention them. Now the fucking General? _She’s_ a ghost.”

“He’s not a ghost,” Nails said. “And he ain’t a bitch. No bitch is gonna stand toe-to-toe with a fucking 20 foot tall deathclaw and come away alive.”

“Look, asshole, the General’s got a set of tits your mother’d be jealous of.”

A.K. snorted. “You said the same thing about that deathclaw. You remember that shit, Nails?”

Nails laughed. “He was pissin’ his pants, screamin’ about them! How much fuckin’ Psycho’d you take that day?”

“Fuck you both. I was stone sober that day. I saw the fucking things.”

“See what Psycho’ll do to you?” Nails said to the brat. 

“I’ll tell you how they do it,” A.K. said wisely, well, as wisely as a strung out raider was capable of. “They’ve got that coat, right? The General’s coat? They just take turns wearing it. That’s why no one knows what the fuck that asshole looks like.” He paused. “They even let that tit-covered deathclaw wear it!”

Harp kicked at A.K. “Fuck you, you cunt. She wasn’t tit- _covered_. She had two tits. A right one and a left one.”

Nails gasped. “You can count? Since fucking when?”

“Suck my two hairy balls, shit-eater.”

“What I wanna know,” A.K. started, “is why in the fuck people kept them damn chame-le-whats as _pets_? I mean, I’ve seen pictures of them. Their tongues were as long as their fucking bodies and they grabbed things with them.”

“Maybe they was smaller back then.”

“You stupid prick, _I’ve seen pictures_. There’s pictures of them eating bloatflies like they ain’t _nothing_. Just gulp and gone. If anything, fucking deathclaws are smaller.”

Nails shook his head. “If they was bigger back then and they was pets, how the fuck did anyone live long enough to blow the world to shit?”

They were all silent at that thought. They couldn’t read, and they didn’t really need to. So when A.K. had found pictures of chameleons and articles about the genetic splicing that gave way to the creatures that became deathclaws, he just assumed they’d been that big before.

“I don’t fuckin’ know, man. But what I do know is I see a fucking caravan ahead.”

Harp grinned. “Offload the brat and go get Psycho. And we only gotta share it three ways.”

They approached the caravan. The leader got down, and the raiders heard the cocking of rifles.

“Easy, assholes. We got one of them. Now give us our shit.”

“Drop him there and back away,” the caravan leader instructed. He went over and looked the boy over. “He’s good. Nice looking, plump, and he’s got spirit. Settler brats really do make much better slaves than scavver brats. But I believe I asked for _two_.”

“Yeah, well, shit happens, my man. But we got you half the delivery.”

He nodded. “And so you should have half of the payment?”

“Uh…” Fuck. “Yeah, sure. Fair’s fair and all, right?”

The leader picked the boy up and carried him up into the wagon. He shut the kid in a cage and cut the rope around his wrists, leaving the kid to do the rest himself.

“Pay them,” he told his people. “Only half.”

Three shots rang out and each raider was left gutshot. 

“If you’d brought both, I’d have ordered a clean death.”

The caravan started off, leaving the three raiders to die. Their deaths were quicker than the caravan leader had expected. A pair of super mutants passed that way not an hour later and found the dying men. They did not pass up on the free meal.

03

Gary was sold three more times by twelve, each time going farther west and south. They’d never learned how to control him. They’d beat him, they’d threaten him. One of them left him with a fractured wrist. But still, they couldn’t control him. When he was thirteen, his current owner sold him to actual slavers. They dealt with all sorts, and they gave the caravan more than their investment had been.

They took him south to the Capital Wasteland, formally known as D.C.. They kept him tranqed with Calmex, and it was only a matter of days before he was hooked on it. It helped keep him quiet while he was in the cage. They knew that once he got out and could get into the Calmex himself, that his obedience would go out the window.

They didn’t dose him on the last day of the return run, not until the ruins of the strip mall came into view. The sign Paradise Falls with the Ice Cream Boy statue looming over it. Paradise Falls was _the_ place to go for slaves in the Capital Wasteland.

They took him through the gate and tranqed him. Once he was passive, they opened the cage and locked a slave collar around his neck. They were pre-war tech, but they were genius. They contained a nice little tracker that broadcast the collar’s position to its controller. There was always someone monitoring their locations, a main controller panel at the ready just in case. The collars held enough explosives to blow the head off the slave if activated - or if it got out of range of a controller - and all without harming anyone but that slave. They had microphones built in, so any talk of uprising and that collar was set off. It was an effective means of controlling their stables. 

As the Enclave was fond of saying, God Bless America. Their government had made these little beauties as a way of controlling government employees. And they had been built to last.

They handed him an inhaler of Addictol and told him to take it. Gary was stoned enough to just do as they said. They threw him in a cage with the other under-15s and watched as his eyes cleared. Addictol was a wonderful agent; it cleared the mind and cured addictions instantly. The only real problem was how fucking rare it was, but the boss wanted them broken first, junkies later.

The brat ran at the gate, as if it would do a fucking thing. They took a step back and eyed him. 

“That collar around your neck is rigged. You run, I blow it,” one of them - a white man named Forty - explained. “You piss me off, I blow it. You take it off, it blows on its own. Get me?”

“Fuck you,” he spat.

“You’ll probably be here a couple years. Most people are too high minded to buy someone who isn’t an adult.” He shrugged. “Get used to it, brat.”

They left him alone with the other children, most of whom had already broken. They gave him enough of a leash to let him try and rouse the kids into fighting back, but none were willing to take him up on it. Every so often, Gary saw someone’s head explode because they’d done something wrong.

He was just over fourteen when he decided that, when they blew his head, he was going to take one of the fucks with him. He didn’t know how, but he was going to find a way. They beat him daily, tying him down and laying into him with whatever was handy until he blacked out. They’d see hints of fear in his eyes, but he was so full of hate that they still had trouble with him. They locked him in the hot box. He’d broken down after, but it was a momentary thing. There were some nights he sang a godawful classical piece called ‘Louie, Louie’ all night.

The leader of Paradise Falls - a brown man of 61 named Eulogy Jones - finally decided on a way to control the brat. If this didn’t work, then he’d just kill him. Settler kids were invariably healthier than wastelander kids, so they were worth more; he didn’t want to just lose that investment. So he got creative.

He had a couple of his workers bring the boy inside. Gary struggled in their grasp, but two adults on Buffout - a strength enhancing chem - were more than a match for a half-starved 14-year-old. Eulogy went over to him and held out the controller for his collar. He pressed a button and Gary winced, expecting it to blow. Instead, he heard to disengage and the lock popped open. His eyes widened in surprise and then narrowed warily as Eulogy took the collar off of him.

“The fuck’s this?”

“Well,” Eulogy drawled, “You’re just being trouble, now aren’t you? We’ve been beating you longer than I’ve ever bothered with, and you’re still… being… trouble. So. We’re done with this.”

“I wasn’t scared of you shit-eaters before; I ain’t scared of you now.” It was bravado. He _was_ afraid of them. But they were like dogs and he wasn’t showing them fear.

“No, I suppose not. You see, I can’t have a slave that doesn’t obey me. That’s bad for business, and I’m a businessman at heart.”

“Then fucking shoot me and be done with it.”

Eulogy laughed a long, slow, cold laugh. “No, no, you see, I paid good caps for you, Gary. I kill you, I lose that entire investment.” He nodded to his two lackies, who tightened their grip on Gary. He slapped a new slave collar on him and activated it. “Now, this has a tighter range than the normal kind. We had to fuck with it a bit. You won’t get as far before it blows.”

“Because I gave a fuck before, right?”

“We’re going to walk outside, just you and me, Gary,” Eulogy purred. “And if you want to still walk out the front gate, why, I’ll even open it for you. Hell, after today, you can leave at _any_ time. I might even let you in the barracks.”

Gary eyed him warily. “Okay.” He knew there was a catch.

Eulogy motioned to the door and Gary followed him. Eulogy held the controller up. “This goes to your modified collar. Now, I’m going to press the button and trigger your collar. After that, you can walk out if you want.”

Gary stared him down as Eulogy pressed the button. Gary saw the glow of the collar around his neck… and then heard one of the slave collars explode. He turned; it had been one of the girls in the children’s cages.

“Now, let me explain how your new collar works. You take it off, it sends out a signal to every collar nearby and kill every slave within range. You disable it, same thing. You walk out of range, I’ll trigger it and it’ll start setting collars off at random until you get back in range.” He paused, letting the boy stare at him in horror. He knew he had him. “If I have to punish you beyond a beating, I press the button and someone else dies.”

Eulogy walked over to the gate and swung it open. “So, go ahead and leave, Gary. You’re free.”

“How the fuck is _this_ free?” he whispered. He could hear his voice trembling. He didn’t want to kill all of these people. They’d been good to him, as good as they could be anyway.

“A smart man once said: free men make choices, a slave obeys. You can leave, or you can freely choose to remain my slave.”

Gary looked over at the dead girl. Her name had been Amanda. They’d taken her two raids ago. She cried every night, and he gave her half his meals when they came. And she’d died as an example of what Eulogy would do if he disobeyed him. He bowed his head.

“I’ll stay.”

“Good, boy. Well, since you’re one of _my_ boys now, you can sleep in the barracks. Hell, you can sleep in the cage if you still want. _Your choice_.”

“Can I… can I bury her?”

Eulogy scoffed. “Dead slaves get fed to the hounds. You know that.”

He ordered a couple slaves into the cage to gather up the dead girl and take her over to the hound pit. Gary watched them go, feeling nothing but guilt over her. Because he hadn’t obeyed. Because he’d been trouble. _He’d brought that on her_.

“I’ll sleep in the cage,” he said quietly and went back into the children’s cage.

Eulogy locked him inside and left him. No one would go near him, as if just being around his collar could trigger theirs. He didn’t blame them. He curled up by the door and cried over the girl who’d died because of him.

04

Gary became a good worker, doing everything he was told without complaint or hesitation. Eulogy hadn’t even had to beat him ever since. And once the other slaves saw that he wasn’t going to cause more trouble, they slowly started talking to him again. The slaves didn’t want him to hate them, and Gary understood that their mewling tokens of friendship was just another way they begged for mercy. For the most part, they also stopped disobeying Eulogy. Gary was sacrificing himself for them; they couldn’t just flout that.

When he was 15, Eulogy had him moved into the barracks. He had no choice in this. He left the people who relied on him for their lives, people who he’d honestly come to care about, and went to live among the slavers. He kept his head down and didn’t talk to them unless they started it

It was two weeks before the first time he was raped. He struggled under his attacker, who threatened to let Eulogy know, and then he went limp. He just closed his eyes and let it happen, because he couldn’t make the choice to kill those other slaves. They were the only family he had.

That first attacker wasn’t the only one. Several of the slavers fell on him after that, kicking and beating him, some of them raping him. Because they could. Because he couldn’t do anything about it.

The next morning, Gary went down to the dispensary. He asked the ‘doctor’ - a white, grey-haired woman named Cutter - for something for pain. It was the first time he tried Med-X, a strong opiate used to reduce one’s awareness of pain and to make one care less about it. It gave him a nice buzz and helped with the pain.

That afternoon, Eulogy apologized for his men’s behavior, and told him they would always, _always_ give him a choice from now on. Eulogy instituted a new rule on Gary, too. No more than three men were allowed to use him per night. Anymore and they’d have to pay top cap. Gary knew better than to refuse, and every night went to the bed of at least two of the slavers. Sometimes they only wanted a blow job (fuck, he liked those nights best; they were quick), some of them just wanted to beat on him. Med-X quickly became a daily thing, and Eulogy was only happy to see him well supplied with it.

Months flew by, but Gary had lost all sense of time. Days blurred together in a haze of Med-X. But one cool night at the end of summer, Eulogy found him in the barracks just as his first fuck of the night called him over.

“Sorry, boys. Gary is officially closed for business.”

Gary blinked slowly at Eulogy and started shivering. “I ain’t being bad, Eulogy. I’m doing just what I’m supposed to.”

“Oh, I know you are. But I’m closing up shop. You’re moving out of the barracks and into the house.”

It took a moment for what Eulogy said to break through the fog of Med-X he was wrapped in. “I’m only fucking you from now on, yeah?”

Eulogy smirked. “Well, yes and no. Words gotten around that you’re a good fuck. I’ve had a few people popping in, asking if you’re for rent. I can’t deny my customers, now can I?”

Gary lowered his head. “No, Eulogy. That’s bad for business.”

“Good answer, Gary. Come on now.”

He put an arm around Gary’s shoulders, as if they were friends, and led him to the house. 

“You go pick you an empty room. Tomorrow, you start working around here. You bring me 100 caps a day to start out, and we’ll go from there.” He picked a bottle up from the table. “Here. Something to help.”

Gary looked at the name. “Day Tripper?”

Eulogy smirked. “It’ll help you turn on the charm, baby.”

He nodded; he assumed Eulogy was ordering him to take it. “Yes, Eulogy.”

Eulogy shooed him and Gary found a room. Eulogy saw to it that he was given his own stash of Med-X, although never more than five vials at a time. Five would knock most adults out for a day, at least. He made sure Cutter only replaced the empty vials. If Gary didn’t have a vial to give back, he didn’t get more. But he _always_ had a vial to return.

He started popping Day Tripper in the mornings. It made him feel weak and sluggish, but Eulogy had been right; it helped turn on the charm. He went down into the main area and smiled and flirted with everyone, the drug doing the work for him, until an older man came up to him.

“How much?”

“200 caps,” Gary said and then looked around. He lowered his voice as if he didn’t want to be overheard. “But for you, darlin’, 150.”

He smirked and followed Gary to his room. He handed over the 150 caps and, once counted out, Gary threw him a fuck. He took his sweet time, too. Not that Gary was gonna complain; 150 caps was more than enough for the day. He let the client fall asleep in his bed; he’d paid well.

He left without complaint in the morning and Gary brought the 150 caps to Eulogy. Eulogy looked pleased and counted out 100 of them.

“Rest is yours kid,” he paused. “Rent on your bed is ten caps, and I’ll just take those. How much Med-X you take yesterday?”

“Just one.”

Eulogy looked at him critically. “Alright, just one. That shit ain’t cheap, you know? It’s 50 caps a vial.” He counted out the rest of Gary’s caps. “You still owe me ten caps.”

“You didn’t tell me…” he whispered. “I’ll get it for you.”

“Ten caps… Hmm. You wanna work it off?”

He nodded. “Sure. I’ll do that.”

“Go down to the barracks. Tell them you have one slot open this morning.” Eulogy looked him over, a slow and cruel smile surfacing. “Tell them fucking’s off the table though.”

Gary bowed his head. “Yes, Eulogy.”

He went down to the barracks and did what he was told to. The slaver who jumped on the chance beat the fuck out of him. He went back to his room after and eyed the Med-X vials. 50 caps. Each little vial he took was 50 caps. He popped a Day Tripper, but it didn’t help; it made him hurt worse. It hadn’t even been an hour when he loaded up the needle and injected the Med-X. He’d just have to aim for 160 caps every day. He could do that.

Of course, it didn’t stop there. Once Eulogy was sure Gary was hooked on Day Tripper, he started charging for that, too. That was, at least, much cheaper; only 40 caps for a bottle of 28. But as another smart man once said: no one works so hard for you as a junkie.

05

Gary was 20 when Eulogy retired and left a woman who went by the name Carolina Red in charge. She was someone even the slavers gave a wide berth, and Gary did _not_ look forward to having her in charge of his controller.

A caravan came through two weeks into her time as boss. They bought ten of the slaves. Gary approached the caravan owner as he was loading them into his cart.

“How far do you go?”

He looked down at Gary. He could see the track marks along the slave’s arms. “I do a loop that takes a year. Head south far as Atlanta, swing west to Knob Creek, head back up north to the Pitt, then Bunker Hill, and make my way back here again.”

“Must get lonely,” he said quietly. “All those hours on the road…”

“I’ve heard-a you. Your collar ain’t quite standard, is it?”

He shook his head. “No, baby, and it gets me hot.”

A lie. But he wanted to get away from Red. Torture was one of her hobbies and he’d already built up a resistance to the Med-X. They wouldn’t let him touch the Psycho. It increased a person’s pain threshold, yeah, but made them aggressive. They didn’t want the slaves to be aggressive.

He looked to be considering it. “What’s your poison?”

“Med-X, two a day. Day Tripper, a bottle a week. And I take a stimpak every three days to keep myself healthy.” He shrugged. “Looking like a strung-out whore’s bad for business.”

His brow rose. “And you expect me to cover that?”

Gary shook his head. “No. You stop at a bunch of settlements along the way, yeah? Everyone wants a little company. Red’s take is 200 caps a night I work, plus 10 caps room and board every night, plus the chems.”

He looked very interested and, after several moments, looked beyond him. “Hey, Red! C’mere.”

She came over, glared at Gary and held up a hand to hit him. “You _know_ I’ll blow them slaves.”

“Oh, he ain’t done nothing wrong, Red. I wanna buy him.”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. He brings in good money.”

“Yeah, but think of how much you spend on his chems, honey. I bet you ain’t even breaking even. His Med-X runs you 100 caps, that Day Tripper is 40, and stimpaks? Fuck, honey, I’ve seen ‘em as low as 30 and as high as 125. And he brings you in, what, 200 a day?”

Red looked like she was trying to do the math. She wasn’t the sharpest of people, and there he was throwing all those numbers at her. “Tell you what, gimme 1,000 caps an’ you can have the whore.”

They dickered for a while. He conned Red into taking a bunch in trade, and Gary was pretty sure that the caravanner only paid 500 caps worth of stuff for him. Red took him inside to explain, privately (she was smart enough to do that, at least), how to reset his collar to only the slave collars he wanted and reminded him to always travel with slaves, and the younger, the better. Their little whore had a soft spot for kids.

The carvanner reset the collar just to the slaves he’d bought and headed out south. 

“Name’s Demetre,” he told Gary once they were out of Paradise Falls. “Him back there?” He nodded to a man sitting on the back of the cart, with a shovel at his hand. “That’s Vic.”

“Gary,” he said tensely. He hadn’t even thought about going through the gates in at least five years. And he was waiting for the explosions to start, for people to start dying just because Red _could_. But when none came, he relaxed some.

“The fuck kinda name for a whore is ‘Gary’?”

He shrugged. “Just always been ‘Gary’. I dunno who decided on it.”

“You need something more… More interesting.”

“Like what?”

Demetre shrugged. “The fuck you asking me for?”

“Because you own me,” he said flatly.

“Sure enough, sure enough.” Demetre thought for a moment. “How ‘bout we go with X-Z, like one-a them synths from up north. They all got these two letter and two number names. And people are freaks enough to wanna fuck them. Might make you exotic and get you better caps.”

“X-Z,” he shrugged. “Sure. I get more caps, you get more caps.”

“Since we ain’t gotta base somewhere, I think we outta have a different arrangement from yours and Reds. How much you bring in a night?”

“Enough to cover my debts. Eulogy always found an extra charge if I brought in more money. Red…”

“Is a numb cunt,” Demetre supplied.

Gary shrugged. “Sure. Red wasn’t too good with numbers ever. So we settled on that. I’d bring in 310 to 350 a night and just about break even. The fuck do I need caps for, anyway?”

Demetre nodded. “Then you’ll just fork it all over to me, and I’ll keep you in chems.”

“Sounds good.”

It wasn’t as if he was going to protest. Demetre was good as his word. Gary got good at telling which people would react better to the idea of a synth whore and which people would react better to a human one. He played it up, either way. 

Vic was an odd one to Gary. He’d jump off the cart if they passed any brahmin shit, especially if it was from the ones pulling the cart, and scoop it into a bucket. If they overnighted in a settlement, he’d vanish with the bucket and come back with a box.

They’d been on the road for months when Demetre had Vic bring a box over to them. Inside was a bunch of plastic inhalers. Demetre picked one up and held it out to Gary. 

“These beauties? I can sell ‘em for 50 caps each. It’s what Vic does with all the brahmin shit.”

Gary eyed him warily. “What the fuck do you make out of cattle shit that’s worth 50 caps?”

“It’s called Jet. Try it,” Demetre prodded. 

He looked away uncertainly. He didn’t think he could say no. “Do I make enough?”

“Fuck, kid, it don’t cost us nothing but shit. Maybe it’ll help with your Med-X habit. Makes you feel like the world around you just slooows right down. It ain’t gonna do shit for pain, but ain’t like I beat you.”

He put the inhaler in his mouth and depressed it, breathing in what Vic had made. The effect was almost instant. Everything did seem so much slower. Vic and Demetre were laughing, and it sounded like one of those record players they’d find every so often, just set to slow.

“I think he likes it,” Vic said over the course of an hour.

“Nicer buzz than the Med-X, huh?” Demetre said over the course of a week.

Neither of them ever touched the shit. Jet was one of those drugs that was almost instantly addictive. And they planned on having him hooked before they got to the Pitt. They were off-loading their recently bought slaves, and they never could be certain if they’d find any in the Pitt worth buying. And there was no point in taking them to the fucking New England Commonwealth. They had enough issues with the fucking Institute that they just didn’t buy slaves.

By the time they were in the Pitt, he was nicely hooked. Enough so he didn’t notice that he was the only slave aboard. Or he just didn’t care. They ended up having to up his stimpaks to one a day to keep him from looking strung out, but they were all but falling out of everyone’s assholes in Boston.

Once they were back on their way to the Capital, and starting to take on slaves again, they cut his Jet supply back to only a couple a week. That put him right back on the Med-X and helped him ignore the withdrawal symptoms, but it kept him more lucid. He made them more money when he was lucid.

That became his life for five years.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Kingsmen learn about the synth slave and send Gawain to go check him out.  
> Pain ensues.

01

A clean shaven, bald man walked into Zimonja. He wore a pair of dark sunglasses, a ragged pair of trousers, and a ragged shirt. He walked into the center of the settlement and loudly proclaimed:

“For I have seen Him in the Divide, and his Heat hath made me whole! Glory and praise to Atom!”

Harry stepped out of his home and leaned against the wall. “Hello, Deacon.”

“What? Who is Deacon? I am but a humble child of Atom!”

A girl with a long, golden brown ponytail dropped off the platform above him. She put her hands on his shoulders and shoved him toward Harry.

“C’mon, your holiness. Let’s go talk about Atom.”

“Ah, my dear girl, would you perchance yen to-”

“Deacon, I’m gonna fucking punch you if you don’t stuff it.”

She herded him into Harry’s house. It was sometimes her house, too. Daisy went between all the Kingsmen’s houses. She shut the door once they were inside. Maybe they didn’t have any sort of soundproofing or shit like that. Their ancestors had that, sure, but people understood that when Harry was in a meeting to stay away from his house. Don’t listen, and trust in Harry.

Deacon, however, was paranoid and looked all around. Like Harry never checked for bugs and shit like that. They knew that stuff still existed. Harry indulged the agent’s paranoia, however. Deacon had always been a good, if, ah, eccentric, ally.

“Okay, so, we found a new synth. He’s got a fucked up designation, though.”

“How so?”

“It’s just two letters. X-Z.”

Harry frowned. “Could he have dropped the numbers? In an attempt to make it sound like a name?”

“Yeah, I mean, if you kinda slur it, it sounds like Eggsy.” Daisy giggled. “Which is a silly name, but hey, _I_ didn’t name him.”

“So why come to us? The Railroad can make contact with him.”

Deacon shook his head. “I need Merlin’s tech skills. Tom won’t touch it. Too twitchy about this kinda tech.”

Harry didn’t appreciate dramatic pauses, unless he was the one doing them. Still, the head of Kingsman waited for Deacon to continue.

“Someone slapped a slave collar on him. We try to pull him out, and _boom_! No more synth.”

Harry rubbed the bridge of his nose. Synths were already slaves of the Institute. And this one had managed to get out, on his own, only to be taken as a slave by some other asshole.

“Gunners?”

Deacon shrugged and shook his head. “I don’t think so. The real fucked up thing here? He came in with a caravan. And not a local one. Either he got far and got nabbed, or is just an unlucky son of a bitch.”

“Where is he now?”

“Bunker fucking Hill.” It was one of the major trading hubs in the Commonwealth. “Pretty sure the General cleared out the Institute's spies and allies when he took over. She’s a good man, our General.”

Harry didn’t even blink at Deacon’s switching of gender pronouns. Deacon appreciated a good disguise and misinformation. Hell, he told people he was a synth sometimes, although Harry doubted it. It was just another of Deacon's disguises.

“Well, even if they did,” Harry began, stubbornly refusing to call the General either male or female, “there are still caravans that go through and people talk.”

“Yeah, and, uh, we need someone to go, like, yesterday.”

Harry sighed irritably. “Courser?”

“Yep. I’ve seen it sniffing around, but it hasn’t figured out who X-Z is yet.”

Daisy frowned. “How does it not know?”

Deacon shrugged. “All part of the mystery, my man.”

She rolled her eyes at being called ‘my man’. “I’ll go, Arthur. If he’s a slave, he might react better to a younger agent than, well…”

“An agent in his 50s?” Harry asked in his utterly perfected innocent tone.

“You said it; I didn’t.”

Harry was, perhaps, the biggest shit in Kingsman. It had rubbed off on their ward, as Hamish complained about every so often.

“Alright, Gawain. Go after him. Take a bunch of caps and see if you can buy him off his owner.”

“Consider me gone,” she said on the way out. She stopped in to see Hamish on her way. “Merlin, need a bag of caps. Gonna go buy me a slave.”

Merlin eyed her and then shook his head. If she was addressing him by codename, she was going on a mission. He’d ask Harry later why Daisy was buying a fucking slave. He rummaged through Kingsman’s private treasury and got her a bag. The bag quickly vanished inside of her shirt, giving the young agent a more buxom look. She adjusted the bag until she liked it and then struck a pose.

“How do I look?”

“Yer as bad as Harry, you know that?”

She chuckled. “I learned from the best. I’m off.”

It wasn’t a short walk to Bunker Hill; going by the roads it was something like fifteen miles. She’d scope out the place, scope out X-Z, and overnight in the Hill. If she was lucky, she’d own the synth come morning and take him home. Merlin could get the collar off him and they could smuggle him north.

It was early evening when she got there, and she poked around at the shops. Bunker Hill had become a nice little town since the General took over (Daisy was convinced the General was a woman). But instead of actually shopping, the young agent was looking for a man with a slave collar on.

“You know,” she heard the town doctor saying from the next stall over, “I have a good supply of Addictol.”

“Yeah, no. Just. Just let me buy the Med-X. It ain’t just for me.”

She looked around the corner and smiled inwardly. How shocking that someone had sent their slave to stock up on chems. Although, she hadn’t realized a synth could even _get_ hooked.

“Fine. 65 caps each.”

The slave looked physically pained. Pained, and afraid. “I’m supposed to bring back fifteen of them. You were charging 45 caps yesterday; that’s what he gave me.”

“That was yesterday, and he came for them himself. I didn’t realize I was selling to a longtime addict,” he said with a nod to the slave’s arms.

“How about some Jet in trade?”

“I don’t deal in that shit.”

The slave lowered his head. “Fine,” he said quietly, defeated. “Just ten then.”

“I shouldn’t even sell you _that_ much.”

The doctor counted out ten of them and took the slave’s caps. The slave gathered up the Med-X and started back toward a caravan cart. Gawain could see two men by it and followed, slowly and at a distance, as their slave returned. She saw him turn over the Med-X and saw one of the men get red in the face… and then punch the slave in the chest. The people milling around pointedly looked away; they didn’t want to get involved in it.

She watched from where she was as the other man grabbed him by the arms and held him as the first one laid into him. She could hear his pained cries as he was beaten. When they were done, the first one went through his pockets and even felt inside his trousers. He came up empty and shrugged, saying something to the other man, who let go of the slave.

The slave wandered around to the back of the cart and she watched him get into a bag. He rifled through it and then lowered his head again. She saw him sigh and take out a sea blue bottle with a bright orange cap. She wasn’t too good on chems, but a bottle meant pre-war pills and that narrowed it down. She watched him pop two of them into his mouth and chew them. She shuddered at that. Sure, chewing a pill up made it kick in quicker, but it had to be gross. Super gross.

Gawain wandered over to the cart. The two men looked over at her, suddenly all charm and smiles. She smiled back.

“Hey there. Haven’t seen your cart before. Where you from?”

“Oh, we travel all over. Got some exotic stuff here, all the way from Atlanta.”

Atlanta… That was really far south, she thought. Almost to the end of pre-war America. She turned on her best amazed and interested face. “Oh wow! I’ve never even been out of the Commonwealth.”

She looked through their wares. Nothing too special in it, although there were jars of peaches. Fucking shit, she hadn’t even _seen_ a can of peaches in years. She wanted them real bad, but… she wasn’t there for peaches.

“What about him?” she asked, trying to sound shy. “He must cause you trouble to need a beating like that.”

“He ain’t for sale,” the one who’d held him said.

“Oh, come on. Everything’s for sale.”

“He ain’t,” he repeated. “He’s for rent, only.”

Rent only, meaning a sex slave. Fucking Hell, no wonder the guy was living on chems. 

She shrugged. “I dunno if he’s my type for that. See, my daddy runs a place like this. Not as big, of course, but still good for trade. He’s been looking for a slave for _years_. Do you know how hard they are to come by?”

The men laughed. “Not outside of the Commonwealth. I thought, you know, there wasn’t a big market up here.”

“Oh, there’s not. Daddy’s just…” she shrugged. “Well, having to pay someone cuts into profits.”

One of the men nodded sagely. “Oh, I get it. And slaves like him bring in their own income.”

She looked in the cart again and picked up a can of peaches. “I don’t have a brahmin, but I’d buy every fucking can of these if I did. I ain’t seen them since I was little.”

“They haven’t sold well. Apparently no one up this way even knows what they are.”

“I’ll buy them all if you come deliver them.” She flashed him a smile. “I’ll even pay extra for delivery.”

The two men looked at each other and shrugged. “Sure. We leave tomorrow anyway.”

“Oh? Maybe I can hitch a ride back with you.”

They looked at each other and grinned. She wanted to blow both of their heads off right fucking here and now. But the General had rules against that, and Harry liked having access to the trading hub.

“Yeah, sounds great.”

One of them leaned close. “So, why isn’t he your type? Not into men?”

She shook her head and looked around cautiously. “Once you go synth…”

He smiled slowly. “Well, then he _is_ your type. He’s a genuine synth, name of X-Z.”

“Ooh, I wish you hadn’t said that,” she pouted. “You won’t sell him.”

“You want a taste?”

She bounced back on forth on her feet, as if the idea of sex with an enslaved synth was super appealing. “How much?”

“Normally he’s 200 a night. For you, though? Since you’re buying up all my peaches? 100.”

She widened her eyes. “Oh, wow. That’s super nice of you.” She reached into her shirt, making no effort to hide what she was doing. And the fucking pigs were eating the view up. Fuck, men were easy sometimes. “Oh, daddy only gave me 50.”

“Sold,” one of them said. “Well, _rented_.”

She saw the slave pocket something - probably chems - and walk around the cart to her. He was smiling, his lips parted slightly. It made her want to shudder. “Well, I know a nice little out of the way place where no one’ll notice.” She eyed his collar. “It ain’t gonna go off if we go the other side of the Hill and down into a cellar, is it?”

One of the owners shook his head. “No, I upped the radius so he can wander the town.”

“Oh, goodie,” she said excitedly. “Come on then.”

She led him to the cellar. It was a smuggling route, but she knew she couldn’t really do anything. Not unless she could figure out how to fritz out the fucking collar. She shoulda brought Merlin with her.

Once they were down in the cellar, she dropped her act.

“I’m Gawain.”

“X-Z,” he said. “How do you want it?”

“I _don’t_ ,” she didn’t hide her revulsion. “I just thought you’d like a night away from them.”

He shrugged. “Sure.”

He went over to the stairs that led to the route and sat, pulling out a vial of pale purple liquid and a needle. She hadn’t been wrong; he’d pocketed some of the Med-X.

“Is that worth it?” she asked.

He looked up at her, and he’d dropped his own act. She could see the pain in his eyes and how dead he was inside.

“Day Tripper makes the pain worse. Med-X still takes the edge off.”

She went over and sat beside him. “No, I mean… he’s gonna be pissed off when he realizes you stole one.”

He shook his head. “It’s my stash. They keep me well stocked.”

She watched him inject himself. She wanted to slap it away. It wasn’t like there was any taboo against chems. They were freely available. But his arms were covered in track marks and bruises.

“How long have you been on that?”

“Since I was fifteen.”

She studied his face. He was older than she was, but she didn’t know by how much. “What’re you now?”

He shrugged. “Demetre’s taken me on his route five times now, so that’s five years. I dunno how long I spend in Paradise before that though. Shit all kinda… blurs together.”

She winced. That was a long time to be hooked. “I’m surprised it even does anything for pain anymore.”

“Yeah, well, take it three times a day and it’ll help some.”

“Fucking Hell, X-Z. That’s almost enough to knock someone out.”

He shrugged. “Built up a resistance.” He paused. “Got some Day Tripper and a Jet in my pocket still.”

Jet. Holy shit. Holy fucking shit. “No, that’s okay. I don’t like chems.”

He nodded. “I can get that. You ain’t a scavver, not unless you were lying about your daddy. Must be nice.”

She frowned. “The fuck is that supposed to mean?”

He looked at her for a moment. “Do you even know what it’s _like_? I do something wrong, like with that doc, and Vic holds me while Demetre beats the fuck out of me. Sometimes I’m lucky and can placate them with a fuck. But not when we’re in a hub.”

She looked away from him.

“I fuck and bring in money. They keep me in chems. The jet’s the only thing they give me for free, cos they make their own. And they think it keeps me from realizing there ain’t no other slaves in the cart. Truth is, I don’t know how to make it and docs take one look at me and refuse to sell to me.”

“What about chem dealers?”

He eyed her. “Do you really think they let me out of their sight with chem dealers?”

She nodded. “Right.” She paused. “So why does it matter if there’s other slaves?”

“The collar’s rigged to trigger other people’s collars, not mine. We start heading south, they cut back the Jet, and they keep the cage nice and full. Usually with kids.” He lowered his head. “Sometimes I think they’d be better off if I ran and let them die. Collar exploding is quick, and it’s got to be better than this.”

His voice was wavering, but his eyes were dry. She wondered if synths _could_ even cry. Which led her to another question. “You said since you were fifteen.”

“Yeah.”

“How long have you…?”

“I... “ he shook his head. “Everything before that’s hazy. I was a little kid though.”

A little kid. Synths were made, not born. The Institute grew them in fucking pieces, because apparently cloning them made them too human but growing the pieces and lining them with circuitry wasn’t.

“Synths don’t age,” she said simply.

He shrugged. “Gary ain’t a good whore name. And there’s a real market south of here for _exotic_ whores. You wouldn’t believe how many people just line up to fuck me while I’m there. Get a taste of a real live synth.”

“Why not run?”

“I don’t have anywhere to go,” he shrugged. “Plus what would I even do? Ain’t like I know anything else. And…” he tapped the collar. “It’ll set off other collars if I’m not in range, I think. I don’t… remember real well what Eulogy said. But I know if I go out of range, people’ll die.”

“There aren’t slaves in the Commonwealth. Well, besides actual synths.”

He looked at her, his brow raised. “There’s slaves everywhere. Damn, you’re fucking sheltered.”

“Am not,” she said huffily. “Idealistic, maybe a little naive, but I ain’t sheltered.”

He shrugged. He wasn’t going to argue the point, even if he thought she was.

“You know… there’s tunnels just behind us. They’ll take us out of the Hill.” She put a hand on his arm. “You don’t have to-”

He shrugged his arm, not enough to knock her hand off but enough to let her know he didn’t want that touch. “And kill a bunch of people who had nothing to do with it, other than being in range.”

She nodded. She wasn’t going to convince him that slaves weren’t really a thing in the Commonwealth. Okay, well, so they _were_ a thing, but the collars… She’d only seen one or two in her life.

Fuck, maybe she _was_ sheltered. Maybe his fears really were real.

She sighed. “Okay. I just. I don’t _like_ seeing people treated like that, synth _or_ human.”

He smiled just a little and sighed something that sounded like it might have been a laugh. “Ain’t never run across someone like that.”

“Well, people like me aren’t really the kind of people you’d see, I guess. You know, Gary? You should drop the synth thing while you’re here.”

“Eggsy,” he said. “Or X-Z. I ain’t actually used ‘Gary’ in years.”

She nodded. “Okay. Eggsy then. Do you know what the Institute is?”

He shrugged. “Some kinda boogeyman?”

“Well, yes and no? They’re the ones that make synths. And they don’t _like_ escaped synths. There’s a courser out looking for you.”

“What’ll it do?”

“If it can’t reset you, and, uh, since you’re not a synth, it can’t, it’ll have orders to kill you.”

“Nice. What’s a courser look like?”

Her eyes widened in actual surprise. “I’m not kidding. It’ll kill you.”

He looked over at her. “I know you’re not.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know which one they sent. And I wouldn’t tell you if I did.”

He sighed and shrugged. “Look, if you ain’t actually interested in what you paid for, you care if I get some sleep?”

“No, you go ahead. There’s a couple mattresses in the room back there. It’s still inside Bunker Hill, so it won’t set your collar off.”

“Thanks.”

He went into the back room and found the mattresses. He curled up on one and was asleep almost instantly. It was a skill he’d learned, sleeping whenever he had the chance. But his sleep was never dreamless, and he thrashed in his sleep, crying out against attackers. Daisy sat awake most of the night, listening to him pleading with people. When he finally fell silent, sleeping deeply enough to either not dream or just not react physically, she let herself sleep.

02

She hitched a ride back to Zimonja with the caravan. She pretended not to notice or care that Demetre kept ogling her. She kept up the act, giggling at his terrible jokes. She directed them, the journey back taking far less time than it had for her to get there.

She smiled to herself as they passed through the walls. She knew Alistair was up in the crow’s nest and watching them through the scope. Harry came out when the caravan stopped.

“They wouldn’t sell, daddy” she called over to him. “But they’ve got stuff I wanted anyway, so I brought them back with me. They go _all_ over.”

Demetre got out of the caravan and went over to Harry. “We thought we might stay the night, see who wants to buy what. Your girl there wants all the peaches I have. 30 caps a piece.”

Harry nodded. “Sure, the warehouse is there.”

“X-Z,” he called over and the slave got out of the cart. “Go take those peaches into their warehouse.”

Harry stared at Eggsy and fought to hide his reaction, because the slave looked like Lee. Not identical to him, but enough to be, say, his son. He waited until the caravaners were discussing how many cans there were and he turned around to Daisy.

“Is he a synth? Do you know?” he hissed angrily.

She was taken aback by his tone. “No,” she whispered, “he’s just some slave. Goes by Eggsy.”

“Is that his real name?”

“...why does that even matter?”

“Answer me.”

“No, Arthur. His name is Gary.”

Harry paled. Gary. It was Gary. After all these fucking years, and he was some asshole’s slave. He looked up at the crow’s nest. Percival nodded and took aim. The first shot rang out and Demetre’s head exploded. Vic pulled his gun and turned toward Harry, who just stared at him coldly.

“You piece of shit! You think you can just-”

What Vic was saying was lost as Percival shot again. Eggsy didn’t even cower. He just stood by the cart, waiting. Harry looked up at Percival and shook his head once. He nodded and went back to looking around, making sure there were no threats nearby.

Harry went over to him, slowly. “Gary…?”

He looked at Daisy and then at Harry. He shrugged. “Whatever you want.”

Harry felt his throat closing. Gary didn’t know him, but it had been fifteen years since he’d vanished. “She says you go by Eggsy, too.”

He shrugged. “Yeah, Demetre said Gary ain’t a good whore’s name. Eggsy ain’t so bad. But. Like I said, whatever you want.”

Harry looked coldly at the dead bodies. He shouldn’t have had Percival shoot them in the head. They’d deserved worse than that. He went over to the bodies and started rifling through their pockets, looking for the controller to that collar.

Eggsy, seeing that he wasn’t going to be killed, starting doing what he’d been told and unloading the supplies into the warehouse. He started with the peaches and went from there. Wasn’t like anyone else needed them. When he finished, Harry was watching him, controller in his hand. 

“You need to reset it,” Eggsy said.

“What?”

“The controller. My collar ain’t normal. It needs to be reset to your other slaves’ collars. One press of the button and one of them dies, not me.” He shrugged. “I ain’t gonna cause trouble.”

“And if I take it off?”

“They all go off. If you wanna kill them all, but seems like a waste to me.” He sighed. “Look, I bring in good money; I’m a good fuck. I’ll give you everything I make, too. Well, except for enough for Med-X, Day Tripper, and some stimpaks. It’s only like 200 caps a day, plus another 100 a week. Unless your doc wants to charge me more.”

Harry stared at him. Two- _hundred_ caps a _day_ in Med-X and, he assumed, stimpaks. What was that, three Med-X and two stimpaks? And a two bottle a week habit of Day Tripper. Fuck. _Fuck_. Who had done this to him?

For now, he bit that down. “Our doctor could get you clean.”

“Yeah, or you couldn’t and I could bring in more money. Day Tripper makes the whole flirt and attract someone thing easier. More natural. Med-X… well.” He shrugged. “Fucking hurts, okay? And if you want me to be able to fuck after a beating, I need to be able to take the edge off of the pain.”

Harry stared at him in horror, trying not to show it. “Is that all you take?”

“Jet. Vic never showed me how to make it, but if someone does, I can do it. More caps for you, right? I need it more if I don’t have the Med-X. So you’d even get more caps from me that way.”

“I. See.” Harry said. “Let’s. Let’s just find you somewhere to sleep.”

“I got a mat in the cart.”

“I mean a bed,” Harry said gently.

“Oh. A place to _sleep_. Gotcha.”

Harry tipped his head back. “I don’t suppose you’d believe me if I said I wasn’t expecting you to keep prostituting yourself.”

“She said you wanted a working slave,” he shrugged. “But it’s whatever you want.”

He was nothing like the high spirited child from fifteen years ago. But that was to be expected. He just had to keep telling himself that. He led Gary, or Eggsy rather, to his own home. Daisy could stay with the others for a bit.

“Here,” he said, showing Eggsy to the room. “Daisy stays here sometimes.”

“Daisy?”

Harry nodded slightly. “She probably introduced herself as ‘Gawain’.”

“Oh.” He should have realized that, he supposed. “If I ain’t fuckin’, what d’you want me to do?”

Harry shook his head. “Just. Just settle in for now.”

He left Eggsy alone, and got his Kingsmen. They were four more than they had been after Lee’s death. There was Daisy, codenamed Gawain; Roxy, codenamed Galahad; Tilde, codenamed Kay; and Glory, codenamed Lamorak. Glory was a synth, and Desdemona had sent her after Lee’s death. Tilde had been a member of the Railroad at HQ before being reassigned to Zimonja.

“So?” Glory asked.

“He isn’t a synth.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fucking humans.”

“His… _owners_ ,” Harry practically spat the word, “decided that a synth whore was more exotic.”

“Are you quite alright, Harry?” James asked him.

“Have you taken a good look at him?”

Alistair was the only one who nodded. “Yeah, saw it through the scope. Fuck, Harry, it’s not him.”

“He stopped going by ‘Gary’ because that’s ‘not a whore’s name’.”

Glory whistled low. “Holy shit.”

Daisy looked around them. “I don’t get it. Who is he? How do you know him?”

Harry looked at James. There had been a silent agreement between the agents to not tell her, to let her live without knowing the particulars of her mother’s death, or that they’d lost her brother.

“Daisy,” Harry started slowly. “When you overnighted, did you…?”

She gave Harry a cool look. “What kinda fucking question is _that_? Yeah, alright, so I rented him, but not for that. Just so he could have a night to himself. Fucking shit, Harry.”

“Oh, goddamn,” Glory said with an uncomfortable laugh. “Well, at least she didn’t fuck him, Harry.”

James put a hand on her shoulder. “We. Shit.”

“The night your parents were killed,” Merlin started, “the raiders tried to take you with them. They’d been hired to steal settlers’ kids.”

“Yeah, duh, I know that. My dad got me back and died saving me from them.”

“They made off with one child. Gary.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh. Oh, shit. So which one of you…”

“He’s your older brother.”

“My…” She trailed off. “Why didn’t you ever… tell me?”

“Because we’d assumed him dead.”

“You mean you _hoped_ he was dead,” she said irritably.

“Do you blame us?” Harry snapped. “Look at what they’ve done to him.”

Daisy didn’t answer him for a minute. She just looked away from Harry. She knew he wanted to die. She knew he hated everything about his life. “I have a brother.” She shook her head a couple times. “We can’t, we can’t drop this on him right away, can we?”

Harry sighed and looked at Merlin, who shook his head. “I don’t know if he’d believe us, or if he’d view it as some…” He shook his head, the words failing him.

“Some fucked up arrangement,” Merlin supplied.

“I think the first part… should be to get him clean.” Harry looked physically pained. “He’s on Med-X, Day Tripper, and Jet. He’s been using stimpaks to offset the physical effects.”

“He’s been on them since he was fifteen,” Daisy said quietly.

“Fuck,” James shook his head. “That’s not as simple as dose him with Addictol and call it a day. Honestly, I don’t know if it would even touch him at this point.”

“Any suggestions?”

James thought for a moment. “There’s supposedly a machine that can clean someone up instantly. I’ll take a trip out to the Castle and see if Garvey can get in touch with the General.”

Glory nodded. “Yeah, the General’ll know. Took a friend there once and got ‘em clean. I met her; it was like night and mother-fucking day. I’ll go with Lancelot. It’s been a few years since I’ve seen any of them.”

Harry nodded. “Approved.”

“Eggsy… Gary... “ Daisy made an irritated sound. “I’m just gonna stick with Eggsy, okay? I want to help him. I mean, we had a nice talk last night. Maybe I can get him to trust me. Maybe make him see that there’s no slaves here, no one who’ll die if that collar comes off.”

Harry sighed contemplatively. “Alright. James, I know you’d probably prefer to do it, but… I think she’s right. She’s younger than he is and has already shown that she isn’t going to… to use him. I think he would view our -” He motioned to Hamish, James, and Alistair. “- approaches as…”

They nodded. Harry didn’t need to finish. If they’d met Eggsy in Bunker Hill, before they essentially took possession of him, he might have believed it. But now? No. They would have to let him settle in and start to heal before they could approach him.

“What about Galahad, Lamorak, and I?” Tilde asked.

“You and Galahad are his age. Either of you might be able to connect with him without being a threat of sorts.”

Glory snorted. “I’m younger than most of you.”

Tilde swatted her arm; it was a playful thing but her heart wasn’t much in it. “Only because you were made an adult.”

She shrugged with a grin. “Alright, James, let’s head out before it gets too late. I wanna be halfway to the castle before night.”

He scoffed. “It’s, what, an 18, 20 hour walk? Let’s just do it all tonight.”

“Fuck you,” she said playfully. She and James left to gather what they’d need for the journey and headed out. 

“I’m going to go and… and see him,” Daisy said quietly and left.

The rest of them left shortly after, but Harry just stared at Merlin for the longest time before Merlin stepped over to him. Merlin put his hands on Harry’s shoulders and pulled him close. Harry let himself be held and Merlin could feel him shaking. 

“We did all we could, Harry,” he said softly. “Slaves are a big business. We would have had no way to figure out which caravan he was taken by, which route he was taken.”

“If we’d just…”

“Just what?” he challenged. 

Harry sighed. “I don’t know.”

“The important thing is that he’s here now. We can keep him safe.”

Harry pushed up from Merlin. His eyes were dry but Merlin knew it would come eventually. Probably later, when they were in their bed, where Harry never had to be Arthur and could just be Harry.

“We’ll need to get word around, quietly, that he’s not to be taken up on his offers.”

“Yeh know that’ll terrify him, cutting off the only source of income he knows, his only way to pay for his habit.”

“I won’t let Lee’s son prostitute himself.”

“What do you suggest then?”

Harry sighed, feeling helpless. “I could just... give him what he needs. Until James and Glory get back, we won’t be able to do much of anything. I mean, we can try the Addictol, but if James says it’ll barely touch him…”

“Try it first,” Merlin suggested.

Harry nodded. “I’ll go and talk to Doc Anderson.

03

Daisy went to what was normally her room in Harry’s house. She peeked inside and saw him, an empty vial of Med-X beside him. He was laying back on the bed, one arm curled under his head.

“Care if I come in?”

“Ain’t really up to me. If he don’t care, nothin’ stoppin’ you.”

“Eggsy,” she said softly. A saying she’d come across in a holonovel occurred to her: there but for the grace of God go I. This could have been her. This _would_ have been her if her dad hadn’t managed to find her. “It’s okay. If you don’t want me to come in, I can go.”

“I don’t mind you,” he admitted hesitantly. “Just. Don’t tell him, okay?”

She went into the room and sat on the floor, her back against the wall. “Harry? Why not?”

“Ain’t good to let masters know when you don’t mind something. You might be his kid, but slavers are slavers. If he thinks it’ll keep me in line, he’ll slap a collar on you.”

“That’s how they’ve always done it with you, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. They learned quick that I don’t give a fuck about myself. But they realized I wouldn’t fuck around if it meant someone else would die.”

“That’s… really good of you.”

He shrugged. “Demetre made sure to keep little girls in the caravan. He knew I’d do anything at that point.”

“What happened?”

He shook his head. “It’s. It’s real hazy, but the night I was taken. Mum woke me up and told me to watch my sister. Don’t even remember her name now.” He sounded a little regretful of that. “They grabbed me and Mum, she tried to stop them. So they cut her throat. I ain’t never gonna forget the feeling of her blood spraying on me. I tried to fight them and they killed her. Killed my little sis cos of me.”

Daisy was watching him with wide eyes. They’d never told her how her mother had died. “You’re sure they killed her?”

“Yeah. She was there, screaming, and then. She was gone and silent and I heard the gunshots.” He was crying silently. “Went a bit mental. Started biting and kicking. Nearly got away once, I think. When I ended up in Paradise Falls, they brought a girl in. She was younger than me. When they showed me how the collar worked, she was the one that blew.”

“I’m so sorry.”

He shook his head. “Look, I’ll behave, okay? I know he’s got slaves around somewhere-”

“No, Harry isn’t like that.”

“Ain’t your dad, either, is he?”

“He’s… one of them. I kinda have four dads. I was orphaned.”

“Sucks. Explains why you’re so sheltered.”

She pouted. “I’m not sheltered.”

“Right. Sorry.”

“Look, what if I showed you around? I could show you everywhere and then you could see…”

“Can’t. Maybe some other time you can.”

She tipped her head. “What do you mean, you can’t?”

He propped himself up on his arm. She could see the fear in his face. “I don’t mean it like that! Please, I’m sorry.”

“I’m not upset. Promise. Just dunno why you can’t.”

He watched her for a moment before sitting up proper. He rifled through the bag and pulled out an inhaler of Jet. She was tempted to slap it away from him, but she sat there while he took it; she’d already scared him once.

“He told me to settle in,” he said. His voice was slurred, but he sounded so calm. “Didn’t say I could wander about.” He lay back. “Ain’t so bad, really. Got a couple days’ worth left. If he lets me work, even just a little, I should be able to get more. Well, assuming he lets me keep any.”

She sat quietly against the wall. She wanted to go and sit with him, or go and hug him. Or just fucking _tell him_ she was his sister. But he wouldn’t believe that. After a little while, she stood up.

“I’ll come back again, okay?”

“Sure.”

She left him and went to find Alistair. She wanted to know if it was true, if that was how her mother died. She already believed that it had to be true. She wondered if that was what his nightmares had been about.

She detoured from finding Alistair into some bushes and threw up. She moaned in pain when she was done and went to her knees. She started sobbing, clutching herself. Alistair ended up finding her, still sobbing, and she let him lead her away.

04

Harry returned home after visiting Anderson. She’d given him two Addictols, all she had. He knocked on the door into the room he’d given Eggsy. Eggsy was sitting on the bed, the bag with his stash in it at the foot of the bed. He looked very calm and smiled slowly when he saw Harry.

“I brought you some Addictol.”

Eggsy stood up and walked over to him. “But I’m so much more fun like this.”

He stepped back, his hands going up to keep Eggsy from touching him. He held out the Addictol. “Here.”

Eggsy took them from Harry, and then used them, one after the other. Harry could see his eyes clearing and felt hopeful. Eggsy smiled after, but it was more of a grimace. “So. More clear headed. We fuckin’ now or not?”

“I didn’t… come here for that. I only came to give you those.”

Eggsy nodded. “Sure. So, can I go out?”

“You aren’t my prisoner, Eggsy.”

“No, just your slave.”

Harry wanted to offer to take the collar off, but he knew it would terrify Eggsy. That collar was how he’d been kept in line for so long. Until they could get it off of him, there would be no convincing him that he wasn’t a slave.

“You can go out as you like, Eggsy. I’m not going to stop you.”

“Alright.”

Harry left him alone, going into what passed for a gathering room and getting one of the books they’d found on some scavving trip or another. He pointedly stared at the pages, listening as Eggsy quietly walked out of the room and out of the house. Harry closed the book and sat back, tipping his head on the back of the chair. It was going to be a long, painful road to get Eggsy out of where he was mentally.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eggsy starts to get settled in.  
> James and Glory return from their trip, with news.  
> Eggsy, Harry, and Daisy go on a little trip.

01

Harry had heard Eggsy come back late at night. He’d been lying awake, worrying over him, wondering if he’d run. It didn’t bother him that Eggsy might want to leave Zimonja; it bothered him that he’d be on the run _with that collar on_. He didn’t know enough about the tech to know if someone else could control it. He didn’t know if _Eggsy_ knew enough about it, either. And he doubted Eggsy knew how to fight.

Eggsy would be easy prey for the first asshole who wandered by. And the Commonwealth was _full_ of assholes.

If he hadn’t trained to pay attention to every small sound, he might not even have heard Eggsy. The young man was good at being as quiet as he needed to be. He thought, not long after, he could hear Eggsy crying and trying hard to muffle it.

He wanted to go to him; to give him human contact when he needed it most. But he knew, he _knew_ , how Eggsy would take it. He couldn’t bring himself to do that to Eggsy, so he rolled against Hamish - who had been _out_ since getting into bed - and held his pillow over his head to muffle the sound.

He didn’t sleep well.

When he got up in the morning, Eggsy was already gone again. That bothered him a little, and he looked in Eggsy’s room. His stash was laying at the foot of the bed, and Harry could see an empty vial. He’d known it wouldn’t be as easy as two Addictols, but… he’d _had_ to try.

He went out, not exactly to look for Eggsy. He knew he was mother-henning the young man; knew it, and kept doing it. He met Alistair on his way around the settlement; the sniper had been up in the crow’s nest all night.

“He’s on the west side.”

Harry nodded; he’d figured he wasn’t the only one who was keeping an eye on Eggsy. “What’s he doing?”

“He’s…” Alistair paused, looking uncertain. “He’s out at his parents’ grave. You know he…” He paused again, looking westward. “He remembers being taken. He even… told Daisy how their mother died.”

“Shit. Is she alright?”

“She was… upset, to say the least. She seemed calmer this morning. But the thing is, he doesn’t remember ‘Daisy’ being his sister’s name; she said he doesn’t remember her name at all.”

“I’ll go check on him.”

He turned to go and Alistair caught his arm.

“Don’t tell him you know any of that. He’s certain you’ll use Daisy against him; that you’ll enslave _her_ just to keep him in line. He thinks he got his sister killed when they were taken. It’s why he’ll let people do anything to him if it keeps other slaves alive.”

Harry paled. “I won’t let him know.”

They parted and Harry went to the graveside. He stayed back some distance, just watching Eggsy. The young man was holding some of the hubflowers in his hand; he was twirling one between his fingers, and watching it with a thoughtful look.

“They’re called hubflowers.”

Eggsy nodded. “Yeah, I’ve seen them before. They grow in a lot of the, um… New England Commonwealth? That’s what this whole area was called, yeah?”

Harry nodded. “Yes.”

“Is it a problem that I’m over here? I saw the bush and the marker and thought…” he shrugged. “You told them all shop was closed and you haven’t… told me anything else to do.”

“Do you… do you _enjoy_ prostituting yourself?”

“Oh, sure,” he said flatly. “I love it. Some of them get violent and like to hurt me when they’re fucking me, but it’s great.” He winced and shied away from Harry. “I’m sorry. I ain’t had any Day Tripper. I get…”

“Honest?”

“No!” He shook his head. “No, I get… edgy and snappish. I don’t mean to be. Please… don’t hurt anyone because I was an ass.”

“I’m not going to,” Harry reassured. “I _wanted_ an honest answer. So _thank you_ for letting me know you don’t like it.”

Eggsy sighed. “Shop’s open again, ain’t it.”

“No.”

He stopped twirling the flower and looked at Harry again. “No…?”

“Eggsy, you may not believe me, but I don’t intend for you to be a slave. I want you to be happy here. Or… wherever you want to be.”

Eggsy nodded. “Right on.”

Harry could hear it in Eggsy’s tone that the young man didn’t believe him. He didn’t blame him. “Would you let Hamish look at your collar?”

He lowered his head. “Yes, Harry. I’ll do that.”

“ _Thank you_.” He left Eggsy alone. 

Eggsy watched him go with a curious look. Once he saw Harry was actually gone, he started pulling the stems off of the flowers he’d picked, just keeping the purple petals. When he’d stripped three flowers’ worth, he got up and left the grave and wandered the settlement for a few minutes before wandering to the clinic.

Doc Anderson looked up when he came in. “Harry said you might be down here.”

Eggsy sighed. “Right. Sorry.”

“What are you low on?” She sounded less than thrilled.

“Huh?”

“What are you low on?” She repeated slowly.

He shrugged. “Shop’s closed. Ain’t got any caps.”

“I know that. Harry knows that.” She pressed her lips into a tight line. “Until James and Glory come back, I’m to keep you supplied. He already told me the Addictol didn’t work.”

“I.” He just stared at her for a moment. How was he paying then? Well, he was sure Harry would let him know what he was doing, or who. “I got enough Med-X for a couple days and like half of a bottle of Day Tripper.”

She frowned. “Then why did you come down here?”

He shrugged and went over to her table. He set the hubflower petals on it. “Was gonna con a Med-X out of you and go trade it at the bar for some whiskey.”

She shook her head. “Why?”

“Coulda gotten a bunch of it. Add hubflowers, let ‘em steep, and you’ve got a passable replacement for Day Tripper.”

“What? But… hubflower doesn’t have any medicinal-”

“Yeah, just need something to bring it out. Drop ‘em in a stimpak and you’ve got a shitty replacement for Med-X. I mean, _real_ shitty. And stimpaks are only cheaper up this way. Add a couple drops of something acidic to that? You got a passable Psycho.”

She looked at the petals and then back up at him. Harry had brought him Addictol and he’d realized Harry wanted him to get clean. So he was going to stop using, but make alternates so Harry wouldn’t know. “Look, kid, I don’t like that you’re using so many chems, but come to _me_ , okay? Don’t just go and try to make them and maybe fuck yourself up more.”

He nodded. “Yes, ma’am. Are you… gonna tell him what I was gonna do?”

“No. I should, but there’s no reason to.” She paused, eying the petals again. “Where… did you get these, anyway?”

“There’s a bush of them on a grave.”

Her eyes widened. “Lee and Michelle’s grave?”

“I guess?”

“You…” She looked pained.

“I’m sorry. I figured… you know…”

“No, it’s. It’s okay. They were just, they were killed by raiders. They were… They were close to Harry.”

He winced. “Please don’t tell him. Please.”

“I won’t. I promise.”

“Thank you,” he said quietly. “I’ll come back in a couple days, yeah?”

He left, quickly, and wandered the settlement until he found the workshop. A quick glance from the door told him a lot about it. There was so much _stuff_ in it, and he was pretty sure he saw some clothes; the man probably only went back to the house to sleep.

He knocked on the doorframe. “Harry, um, said you wanted to see me.”

“Yeah,” he said, leaving the terminal he was tinkering with and going over to Eggsy. “I want ta try looking that collar over. To see if I can’t figure it out.”

“What’s to figure out? You press one button, it resets the collar to whatever slaves are nearby. There’s a plus and a minus button; those increase and decrease the range. Another sets the collar of. Normally, it’d be the slave’s own collar, but mine redirects the signal to set off a random slave’s collar.”

Merlin eyed him for a moment. “How do you take it off?”

“I don’t,” he said flatly. “I take it off, it sends out the trigger signal until it’s deactivated. Any slave in range dies.”

Merlin nodded. “Yes, yes, but say someone wanted to take it off. How is it locked on?”

Eggsy backed away a couple steps. “It’s not. No one’s fucking stupid enough to take them off.”

“How do you deactivate it?”

“I don’t know! They don’t tell us that shit!” He fell back another few steps. “Please. Please, take it out on _me_. I did something wrong, pissed Harry off. Please.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Eggsy.”

“Then why do you want to take it off?”

Merlin stared at him silently for a moment. “You know you’re the only one with a collar like that around here, right?”

“I know better,” he said quietly.

Merlin just shook his head. He was so accustomed to that being an ever-present threat that he couldn’t believe it not being true. “Where did the caravan buy you?”

He sighed. They were all the same. “Paradise Falls. Capital Wasteland.”

“How far is that?”

“You plannin’ on trading along the way?”

“No.”

Eggsy thought for a few moments, counting in his head, tilting his head side-to-side as he did so. “Thirty days or so, I think.”

Merlin nodded. “Thank you, Eggsy. You can go now.”

“Sure.”

Eggsy left, went back to his room, and chewed up a couple Day Tripper. Harry was a slaver, and that meant he was like all the others at heart, but he was better than Red. Fucking Hell, _anything_ was better than Red.

02

A caravan came through the next day. It was one of the local ones, run by a balding man named Lucas. He had a compliment of four guards with him, and his pack brahmin. Lucas went into the center of the settlement to set up shop, while two of his guards stayed near the walls and set up camp.

Eggsy watched from a distance as Harry went over to them. Fucker was cutting off his income again. As Harry walked away from Lucas, he met Eggsy’s eyes for a moment before moving on. Eggsy took it as a warning. He waited until Harry was out of sight and went over.

Lucas watched him come over and opened his mouth to say something; Eggsy held up a hand to cut him off. 

“I know, I know; my shop’s closed.” He said. “But yours _ain’t_.”

“And?”

“I’ve got some stuff I can trade. I just want a couple Jet.”

“What do you have?”

Eggsy shrugged. “Like I said: my shop’s closed, yours ain’t.”

Lucas raised his brow. “I see. You’re not allowed to offer sex for money, but being offered goods for sex is different?”

“Spirit of the rule,” Eggsy said.

Lucas chuckled, shaking his head. “You’re a ballsy slave, you know that?”

“No, I’m not. Not really. He’s just cutting off my income but still giving me chems. I don’t have caps, so…”

One of the guards snorted derisively. “Maybe you should listen to your fucking _owner_ , slave. You’ll end up paying for the chems he keeps you in, don’t you worry.”

Eggsy glared at the guard. “You think I don’t fucking know that?”

The guard stepped over to him. “You need to watch that attitude, _slave_.”

He brought up the butt of his rifle and smacked Eggsy alongside his head with it, hard enough to drive Eggsy to his knees. He put his hands on the ground and dug in, waiting for the rest of the beating. Instead, a shot rang out and a hole appeared in the ground between them.

Harry was over in a minute, gun out. He stopped when he saw no threat, but he didn’t holster his gun. Because he saw the guard standing over Eggsy, with his rifle up to hit him again. Harry’s gun came up, aimed at the guard’s head. Eggsy saw the look in Harry’s eyes and knew Harry wasn’t bluffing.

“Harry, Harry,” Lucas said as he stood. “It’s a simple thing. Your slave wanted to trade himself for some chems. He said it would be different if he traded for something and not money.”

“So you took it upon yourself to hit him.”

The guard shrugged. “Your slave misbehaved. It needed to be hit.”

Harry nodded and lowered his gun, coming over. “I see. Well, when someone misbehaves, they deserve it, don’t they?” His voice was overly cheerful.

“Exactly, so I was-”

Harry moved quickly, hitting the guard with his pistol and dropping him. The gun was up again almost instantly, aimed at Lucas. “Alistair’s up in the crow’s nest. Tell them to stand down.”

Lucas looked at his guard and nodded. The guard backed off. “Harry-”

“I believe my _exact_ words to you, Lucas, were that you were to treat Eggsy the way you’d treat any other customer. That he was not to be treated like a slave. And that if he offered sex for _anything_ , you were to decline.”

“Ye-es, well-”

“Was that too _difficult_ for you to comprehend, Lucas?”

“Uh, no.”

“Then why is my friend on the ground?”

Lucas looked away. “A misunderstanding.”

“Mr. Miller, I believe you and your guards should clear out. Perhaps by the time you’re in this area again, you will have explained my words to your guards and absorbed them yourself.”

Lucas nodded and started closing up shop. His other guard helped the one Harry had dropped get up and get back to the other guards. Harry crouched beside Eggsy, who hadn’t moved. He was bleeding from where the guard had struck him.

“I’m sorry,” he said weakly. “Please. Please take it out on me. I’m the one who disobeyed you.”

“Here.” He took Eggsy by the arm and helped him to his feet. “Let’s get you to Anderson.”

“I’ve got Med-X already. I don’t. Please.”

“Eggsy,” he said softly. “I’m not angry with you. There’s nothing to ‘take out’ on you. And I’d rather she look at you and make sure you don’t have a concussion or something else.”

Harry led him to the clinic and Eggsy went along passively with his head down. Anderson went over to him and tipped Eggsy’s head up. She made him tip his head to one side and then the other.

“He looks a bit dazed, and this isn’t too deep. Head wounds just bleed like a bitch.” She shook her head. “He’ll be fine. A stimpak and a Med-X. Although… given his habit, I’m going to give him a double dose.”

She let go of him to get the chems and he lowered his head again. Harry had to fight to not go back out and kill the guard. This is what he wanted to avoid. How was he going to ever convince Eggsy that he was free and that they cared for him if shit like this happened?

Harry watched Anderson inject Eggsy and gave him a few moments to start to feel anything from it. “Come on. We’ll get you home, alright?”

Eggsy stood, but wouldn’t look at Harry.

“Anderson, I need you to get me as much Med-X and Day Tripper as you can. Eggsy, what’s the most wanted chem in other trading posts?”

“Stimpaks, mostly. This is… the only real place with a lot of them.”

“Get me as many as you can. Tell Hamish to dig into our funds if he needs to.”

She nodded. “Alright, Harry. Anything else?”

Harry shook his head. Eggsy looked over at him, barely raising his eyes enough to look at Harry’s face. Harry was shaking and Eggsy could see the fury in his eyes. He lowered his head again. And when Harry guided him to the door, he went just as passively as he had gone to the clinic.

“Are you hungry?”

“Yes.”

He guided Eggsy home and to a chair. They weren’t the most comfortable of things, but living in the wasteland meant _most_ things weren’t comfortable. Harry went to the stove - it was just a simple cast iron stove - and tossed enough wood onto the coals to bring the fire back so he could cook.

Eggsy said nothing as Harry cooked. He smelled something strange, but he didn’t ask what it was. Harry brought him a passable plate of scrambled eggs and had one himself. Eggsy started eating silently.

“Do you like it?”

“Sure. It’s great.”

“Eggsy, if you don’t like, it’s alright.”

Eggsy shook his head a little. “No, it’s. It’s good. Never had this before.”

“We have friends up north who have rad-chickens. They’re ugly little things, a type of bird, although they have no feathers whatsoever. Every so often, they bring us some eggs and take…” Harry tipped his head slightly. “Well, we have certain items that can only be acquired here.”

Eggsy nodded. Slaves were in short supply this far north. Harry was a slaver (at least, he believed so). Therefore, that’s what they were trading. 

“I’m going to go on, mm, shall we say a buying trip soon. I’d like you to come with me.”

“Paradise Falls?” He didn’t look up from his plate. “Hamish was asking me earlier about it. They’re a good hub for the type of trade you’re looking for.”

“Is there a limit on how many they keep at a time?”

Eggsy shrugged. “Twenty or so.”

“And how many slavers are there?”

“Eight. Might be more by now, I don’t know. Carolina Red was in charge when I got bought.” He paused and looked up at Harry. “You wanna be careful around her. She’s fucking mental. Loves to torture people and wouldn’t hesitate to enslave another slaver. I don’t really wanna be her slave again.”

“How convenient that I don’t want you to be, either.”

03

James and Glory arrived a couple days later, and they brought someone back with them. Harry was talking to one of the provisioners when they got into Zimonja. The provisioner took a bag of caps from him and was on her way, pack brahmin following along.

“Who’s this?” Harry asked.

“Harry, Cait; Cait, Harry.” Glory said. “She’s friends with the General. _Good_ friends.”

“Stuff it,” the redhead said. She had an Irish accent. “I hear you’re looking for Vault 95.”

Harry raised his brow curiously.

“It’s got a machine that sucks the addiction right outta ya.”

“And you’re certain it works?”

She nodded. “I used it. Trust me. I been clean ever since.”

“How far?”

She shrugged. “Eh, ‘bout as far from here to Bunker Hill.”

Harry nodded. “Then Eggsy and I leave first thing in the morning. I’d like you to come with me, Cait.”

“Ya’d be hard pressed to leave me behind, Harry.”

“I expect I’ll hear the same from Daisy.”

He was not wrong.

They left at first light, Cait leading, Daisy walking alongside Eggsy, and Harry behind. They kept their guns out and kept watch for anyone or anything. All they met along the old, broken highway was a trio of Gunners - a paramilitary mercenary organization - and they did not live long enough to rethink their life choices.

Daisy chatted constantly with Eggsy. He made a point of never looking at her, and spoke as few words as possible. Harry wanted to tell Eggsy that he knew about their… well, he supposed they had a friendship, at least the start of one. But until Eggsy was clear-headed, Harry wouldn’t do that.

They stopped outside the Vault. Harry had heard of these places before, but he’d never actually been inside of one. They were shelters during the Great War, although from the stories he’d heard, it might have been safer to take a chance with the radiation. They all seemed to have had some other purpose.

“They packed this one with junkies,” Cait said. “Decided to experiment on them.”

“Fun,” Eggsy said blandly.

“There’s a machine inside. It’ll make you clean. It ain’t gonna be fun, but it’ll only take five minutes.”

“Sure.”

“Do ya not _want_ to get clean?”

“Harry wants me to.”

Cait eyed Eggsy and then Harry. “Harry, why don’t you and Daisy stay out here while Eggsy and I go down to the room.”

“I should go with you,” Daisy said.

“Daisy, I think-” Harry began.

“He thinks you’d enslave me to make him cooperate,” she said. “If I stay up here with you, he’s only going to do what _you_ want.”

Cait clicked her tongue. “In that case, yeah, you stay up here by your onesome. We’ll be back.”

She led the siblings into the Vault and started taking them down toward the room. Mole rats had moved in since she and the General had been there, but she and Daisy had no trouble killing them.

“Why did you tell him?”

Daisy gave him a patient smile. “He won’t do it, Eggsy. I know you can’t believe me with now, but he won’t.”

“Slavers are all the same,” he said quietly.

“Yeah, they are. Every last fockin’ one.” Cait looked back over her shoulder. “Harry ain’t a slaver though. I’da killed him by now if he was.”

He looked at her warily. “Why’s that? Think you’re better than them?”

Cait stopped and turned on him. He fell back a step at the anger in her green eyes. “Because my parents sold me. I bought my way free and killed them for it.” She turned around again and started walking. “Got nice and hooked on Psycho after. So yeah, if Harry was one of them, I’d focking kill him.”

“Sure.”

“Alright, ya numb fuck,” Cait said in a soft, gentle tone despite her words. “Tell me what Harry’s done ta ya since he’s had you.”

“Cut off my income. I can’t pay him for anything. Not food, not the chems. He won’t let me touch _him_ , so I can’t even pay him that way.”

“So he’s not letting you prostitute yourself. But he’s giving you chems?”

“Yeah.”

“He give you the keys to the chem shop?”

He shook his head. “No, he told the doc just to give me what I take already.”

“What else has he done?”

“He gave Eggsy Addictol,” Daisy offered.

“Not easy to come by, that,” Cait said. “So he really wants you clean. You alright with that?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

He sighed. “Day Tripper helps me with hooking. Med-X, well… fucking hurts, for one thing-”

“Yeah, but he’s not lettin’ ya whore yourself, now is he?”

“Beatings hurt.”

“How many times has he beat you?”

“Well…”

“Trader came through the other day,” Daisy said. “One of them hit Eggsy with his rifle. I thought Harry was going to kill them.”

“What happened?”

Eggsy shrugged. “I was being disobedient. He thought I needed to be hit.”

“Did Harry agree?”

Eggsy shrugged again.

“‘m waiting for me answer.”

“No. Harry, he hit the guard for it.”

“Alright, well… you ain’t focking, you ain’t gettin’ beat. What else you need them for?”

He didn’t answer her.

“That’s what I thought. So, what if ya got clean? You can always get hooked again if you want to.” She stopped outside of a door and looked at him. “The machine’s inside here. I ain’t gonna force you into it. It’s not pleasant, but it’s worth it.”

Eggsy looked at the floor. Daisy put a hand on his arm.

“I’ll make a deal with you, okay? If Harry ever starts hurting you, _I’ll_ buy your chems for you. So you don’t feel like you owe him anything.” Daisy smiled brightly. “I mean, I’ll also shoot him in the head, so there’s that.”

Eggsy laughed softly. “You really could be his kid sometimes.”

“I learned from the best.”

He looked at Cait, looked away, and nodded.

“Alright. Come inside.”

There was a computer terminal inside, and a partitioned room. There was a chair in that room, with ankle, wrist, and neck restraints. The neck restraint was odd; cylindrical with a flared base. Eggsy faltered when he saw it.

“It’s five minutes, that’s all. You sit down, I tell it to do its magic. It’s gonna trap you in, yes, but once it’s done, it lets you go. And you come out, feeling like the world’s different.”

He nodded and slowly crossed the room. He did not want to sit in the chair, but after a shaky breath, he did anyway. 

“I’m throwin’ the switch,” Cait called to him.

She punched in the comand and the hydraulic door between them slammed shut. The restraints snapped shut on Eggsy. The cylinders pressed against his neck, and then needles slammed their way inside of him. Something from the cylinders started pumping into him. And then the screaming began. He arched up against the restraints, fighting to get away, the same as she had. She knew he was probably crying; Hell, she’d nearly pissed herself from the pain of it.

“Eggsy!”

Cait had to grab Daisy to keep her from interrupting the cycle. “You stop it and he’ll have to start over. Believe me, if I’d stopped halfway in, I wouldn’t have gotten in that focking chair again. I wouldn’t have been _able_ to.”

She held Daisy until the screaming stopped, and then the girl pushed her way free of Cait. The door opened and she ran inside. Eggsy was struggling to get up; she grabbed him and helped him to his feet.

“Are you alright?”

“Holy shit…”

Cait leaned in the doorway. “Feels good, right?”

Eggsy looked around, looking at things in wonder. Had colors ever been so _bright_? Had the Vault smelled like this before? For the first time in ten years, he wasn’t the least bit stoned. 

“I…”

“Yeah, I remember that feeling,” Cait said with a grin. “How’s the pain?”

“Kinda dull. Like… I dunno. It hurts, but it’s not…” He touched his neck where the needles had been. “I’ve had worse.”

She laughed softly. “Come on. Let’s see if Harry’s still alive up there, huh? See how dangerous he seems now.”

He gave her an unconvinced look, but followed her. He stopped short when they left the Vault, just staring at things. 

“Is he-”

“He’s fine,” Cait reassured him.

Eggsy turned in a slow, slow circle, looking at everything. The sky, the grass, the ruins of the overpass. Even out to the Glowing Sea, the toxic green cloud ‘sea’ that few could even survive walking through. He reached out and touched the numbers on the Vault door, and let his nails run along it. He leaned his head against the cool metal and wept.

“You forget,” Cait said quietly, “Forget how colors used to look, how things used to smell and sound. And then suddenly, everything is so bright and vibrant. And you haven’t felt that _alive_ since as long as you can remember.”

Daisy leaned against him and put her arms around him. They stood like that until Eggsy had himself under control again. He wiped his face and gently pushed Daisy away before turning around.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hold us up,” he said quietly.

Harry smiled gently at him. “We came here for _you_ , Eggsy. You’re not holding us up.”

Eggsy looked away. He still couldn’t make himself believe Harry. Cait had no reason to lie to him, and the way she reacted… That made him believe she really _would_ kill Harry if she found out he was trading in slaves. But in his mind, he was still Harry’s property, and it would take more than having his system purged to make him believe otherwise.

04

It took almost a week for Harry to get everything he’d needed. He’d told Doc Anderson not to worry overmuch about the Med-X and Day Tripper. With Eggsy clean, he didn’t need to worry about a two month’s supply for him.

The day before, he called all of the Kingsmen to a meet, but he brought Cait and Eggsy with him for it.

“Tomorrow morning,” Harry began, “Eggsy and I are heading to Paradise Falls.”

Cait glowered at Harry. “You better not be about ta tell me that Eggsy’s right about you being a slaver.”

“Oh, yes. Harry’s a slaver.” Glory laughed. “He’s helped people like _me_ escape slavery, but he’s perfectly fine with human slaves.”

“What…?” Eggsy looked between Glory and Harry.

“Glory’s a synth,” Daisy said softly.

“Fucking right, I am.” She smirked at Eggsy. “Thought I was the real thing, huh?”

“Before we get too off track,” Harry began. “Cait, I want you to come with us.”

“I’ll go. But only if we’re putting them out of focking business.”

“That’s the plan,” Harry said with a nod. "I figured between you and Eggsy, we can find whatever we need to deactivate the collars."

“I’m in. I think I'll know what we need when I see it. I _think_.”

“I’m going, too,” Daisy said. “And don’t you fucking try to stop me.”

“I expected that, actually. Alistair, I’m going to need a sniper.”

The agent nodded his assent. 

“Hamish, I’d like you to come, as well. Alistair won’t be coming into Paradise Falls, and I think they’ll be more accepting of two male slavers with a load of girls and one slave they know.”

Merlin nodded. “I’ll come.”

“James, Glory… you’re in charge while Hamish and I are gone.”

Glory grinned. “Sounds like you mean _I’m_ in charge.”

James groaned. “Harry, please, can’t I do something _less_ painful? Like go crawling through a minefield?”

Glory swatted his arm. “Oh, you love it.”

James chuckled. He and Glory had shared a foxhole more than once, and in more than one way. Alistair had even joined them on one occasion. She wasn’t a constant part of their relationship; she didn’t want to be.

“Eggsy tells me that there shouldn’t be more than twenty slaves there.”

James shook his head. “Harry, we don’t have twenty spare-”

“You have two months to get them.”

James nodded. “I’ll send word to the Castle. See if I can’t get a couple Minutemen out here to help build.”

“Good. Hopefully, in the month it takes us to get back, we’ll be able to convince at least _one_ of them that they aren’t slaves.”

“What if they wanna stay in the Capital?” Eggsy asked.

“Then they stay in the Capital.”

Eggsy eyed Harry, not really believing him but not willing to openly challenge him. “What if _I_ wanna stay?”

“No!” Daisy yelled, and then looked down. “I mean…”

“What she means is she would like you to come back and make a life _here_ ,” James supplied.

Eggsy shrugged. “Ain’t got a reason to.”

Daisy looked at Harry, who gave her a subtle headshake. He understood her desire to tell Eggsy; he _shared_ it. But Eggsy didn’t trust them, not yet. He was clear-headed, yes, but still so brainwashed and broken that Harry didn’t think he’d be able to believe them.

She sighed and tipped her head back. “We’ve got a month on the road, right? Maybe in that time, maybe you’ll decide you have a reason to stay here.”

“If you don’t, Eggsy,” Harry said, “I promise, you’ll be free to leave and go… wherever you like.”

Eggsy nodded, but he’d believe it when the moment came. As far as he was concerned, once his collar was deactivated, he was gone.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Road trip!  
> They're making their way across what used to be Massachusetts.

01

Eggsy woke in the middle of the night, and left to check on the wagon. There was enough stuff for them, but they only had stimpaks for trade. He went into the warehouse and started filling a box with varying things. He’d lived on the trading route for long enough to know what they needed.

After that box was full, he went down to the clinic. Doc Anderson had the chems locked up, but a bobby pin later, he had the lockbox open. He took half of her supply of Med-X; some of her Calmex; a few Rad-x, which helped people against the radiation of the wasteland; and a few radaways, which purged radiation from a person’s system.

He closed the lockbox again and wrote her a note. It was slow going and his handwriting wasn’t much better than a child’s, but he let her know who had taken her chems and why. He turned to leave and saw Harry standing in the door.

“It’s not what you think,” he said quietly.

“It’s exactly what I think,” Harry said calmly, putting his hands in his trouser pockets and walking in. “I saw you go into the warehouse. You’re getting things to trade.”

“I.” Eggsy nodded after a moment. “Yeah. Then, guess it’s what you think.”

Harry chuckled softly. “Eggsy, there’s something I need from you.”

Eggsy set the box down. “Sure. You want a fuck or a suck?”

Harry shook his head. “Neither. That’s not what I’m talking about.” He paused. “We’ve never left the Commonwealth. I need you to guide us to Paradise Falls.”

Eggsy looked suddenly uncomfortable. “You don’t think I’ll mislead you?”

“No. I trust you.”

Eggsy looked at him in wonder. No one had ever said they _trusted_ him, even if they _were_ just saying it. Which, _obviously_ , was what Harry was doing.

“I want you to have something. I’d been worried about giving it to you while you were addicted to chems; I thought you might…” He shook his head, shrugging slightly. “I thought you might try and sell it for… I’m not even certain what I thought, but it felt like a bad idea to give this to you then.”

He took a hand out of his pocket and held it out to Eggsy. Eggsy looked at what was in Harry’s hand, and then at Harry, and then back to it.

“You’re fucking with me. I try and take _that_ , and you’ll beat the fuck out of me. I know this game, Harry; I ain’t actually stupid.”

Harry went over to Eggsy, took his hand, and pressed the collar remote into his hand. He closed Eggsy’s hand around it, held onto him for a moment, and then let go of him. Eggsy was staring at him in horror.

“Why? I ain’t. I.”

“Whoever has that owns you, correct?”

Eggsy nodded. “Yeah. That’s. Kinda how it works.”

“Well, now you own it.” Harry smiled softly. “I’ll take this to the cart. I’d like to be on the road shortly.”

Harry picked up the box of chems and left. Eggsy stared at the remote in his hand. If he had it, he could tighten the radius on it, so that the collar wouldn’t be able to find anyone within range. He’d still be a slave… well, he’d own himself? How the fuck did this even work? But no one else would be in danger. _No one_.

He hit the button to reduce the radius until the remote beeped at him. It was as tight as it could be. He put the remote in his pocket and then felt it there. He could run if he wanted to. He could go away and just be somewhere that no one would find him. He could be really free.

He shivered at the thought; it was as enticing as it was terrifying. And fuuuuck, he wanted to just run. After a moment, however, he realized he couldn’t. Not because he still had the collar on. Not because he’d be an easy target. But because Red was still in charge at Paradise Falls. Harry was going to stop that and take her slaves. And Harry needed him as a guide.

He went to the wagon and saw the others were waiting on him, the brahmin already yoked to it. He looked shyly at Harry. “You ever led a brahmin before?”

Harry nodded. “A few times, yes. However that may be, _you_ are the resident expert here. If you’d like to, I have no objections. I wouldn’t expect you to lead her the entire way.”

Eggsy blushed brightly and looked down. _What the fuck even?!_ Demetre had _never_ allowed him to take the lead. And here was Harry, treating him like he was worthy of… of… of not being treated like a piece of shit.

“Yeah, I’ll… I’ll take the first lead.”

He waited for everyone to be on board and settled in. Alistair was actually sitting just behind the brahmin, a pair of binoculars at the ready to keep an eye out for trouble. It was smart, bringing a sniper along. There were always lookouts at Paradise Falls.

He took hold of the brahmin’s bridle and gave it a gentle tug as he started walking. She started moving, following him at a decent pace. But then she’d been Demetre’s brahmin; she was accustomed to long days on the road. He led them along a road that mostly led south-west. He spent most of the day in quiet thought, trying to puzzle out why Harry would treat him like this, why he would put so much trust in just a slave.

02

They’d been on the road two days, and Harry realized that the Capital Wasteland had to be a lot closer than he’d been thinking. It was going to take them a month to get there, yes, but they couldn’t travel constantly. Three or four hours out and they had to take a break and let the brahmin rest; then another three or four hours of travel and they made camp for the night. Eggsy knew, of course, where all the best stopping points were.

They were walking through the ruins of what might have been some pre-war city’s outskirts. Eggsy hopped off the cart and started walking alongside Daisy. He never asked them to stop the cart when he got off, or on for that matter, but he never seemed to mind _being_ asked.

“There’s a turn up here,” he told her. “Well, less a turn and more this and another road meet.” He tipped his head back, looking up at the sky for a couple moments. “We might have to stay here the night, though. Might be a bit too late.”

“Too late for what?” Harry asked, looking over the side.

“There’s a river up ahead. A ferry takes people across certain hours of the day. Fifty caps a cart. There’s a campsite on both sides of the river. They keep it stocked with clean water and food, mostly for the cattle but they ain’t gonna care if you grab yourself a drink.”

“Mm, trough water. Tasty.”

Harry could see Eggsy start to grin and then fight it down. He had to wonder if Eggsy would have allowed himself to react if it had just been the two of them; and wonder how long it would be before Eggsy felt safe to react around her, or any of them.

“It’ll be in barrels.”

Daisy looked sideways at Eggsy. She _thought_ he wanted to say something more, maybe make a smart-assed comment about trough water. But he was pointedly looking ahead, his face set in what someone else might mistake for calm serenity. She knew it was an act, and she could see where he was still tense and fighting to keep from seeming to feel much of anything.

For as much as she wanted to push him, to get him to make the comment he’d bitten down, she couldn’t. Harry was right there, and she knew Eggsy saw him as a threat. To her. It sickened her, that he could recognize that Harry had helped raise her, that Harry cared about her, but still believe that Harry would enslave her if it meant keeping him in line. Because what kind of person would _do_ that?

It wasn’t a question she really wanted answered. Ever.

“Why not just… I don’t know… go north or south or just… what’s-it-called…” She paused. “Where you take them across…”

“Ford,” Eggsy said. “North is too irradiated still. Lots of ghouls up there, though. Bunch of them pre-war. There was a reservoir up there. Ain’t as bad as the Glowing Sea, apparently, but still enough to make you or me a ghoul.”

Daisy shuddered. Ghouls were effectively immortal. They aged so slowly that pre-war ones were still basically the same age they had been 200 years ago. She’d heard rumors about one that’d been trapped in a shelter the entire time and had come out alive, even after all that time without food or water. It had the major downside of making you look like a zombie. And if you weren’t lucky, the radiation would eat your brain and you’d run at anything that even looked tasty.

“South is raider territory. And if you wanna ford the river, well… the river’s runoff from the reservoir, so…”

“So don’t go in the water.”

Eggsy nodded. “It’s why they only do it certain hours of the day. Hottest part of the day and you’ll be reeling as you cross. There’s a dam up yonder what opens up same time every day. Ain’t no one ever figured out how ta shut that fucking terminal off. Some sorta wartime lockdown thing.”

“Good precaution,” Merlin said from where he was sitting in the wagon. “Until the people with the passcodes all die.”

“Why not just shoot it?” Alistair asked. He’d found that most problems could be resolved with one, maybe two, shots.

“They dropped a fuckin’ nuke on it, bruv. It was in an underground bunker or somethin’. Ask Fred about it if you’re interested.”

“And that is?”

“The ferryman this side. Or Ted. Never been sure which is which, but ain’t like I talk to them ever.”

Alistair nodded. The ferrymen were ghouls. That made a certain amount of sense, given the radiation in the water that they would be exposed to, simply by being close enough to it, on a daily basis. And how Eggsy knew about an area that no normal human - or no ‘smoothskin’ as the ghouls put it - could enter.

Eggsy put his hand on the lead and slowed the brahmin to a stop. “Harry, you ‘n’ Daisy oughta switch. They expect that the trader’ll be the one leading.”

Daisy climbed up into the cart and lounged - as best as one is able to in a cart - beside Merlin. Harry got down, eying Eggsy.

“You know we can learn to get off and on without stopping?”

Eggsy nodded and gave the brahmin a tug. “It’s a bitch to get down though. I fell a _lot_ before I got it down. No need for you to get hurt, right?”

Harry frowned slightly and put a hand on one of the cow’s two heads for a moment as she started moving. Eggsy was just so… _casual_ … about being hurt. It kept surprising Harry in little ways. Like that.

“Well, it _is_ appreciated.”

And there was that shy look again. It _hurt_ Harry to see that, that shyly pleased expression Eggsy let show for just a second whenever Harry thanked him for something. Harry was going to thank him until it stopped being such a novelty for Eggsy; until he accepted that being thanked wasn’t something reserved for other people, or for people who showed him mercy.

Eggsy handed him the lead and fell back behind him, staying close enough to be at hand if - well _when_ really - he was needed, but back enough to make it clear that he wasn’t trying to lead. People on the route knew he was a slave; it would just seem… strange… if he wasn’t acting like he should be. And talk of that kind of strangeness spread quickly. 

They pulled into the campsite, Eggsy quietly giving directions behind Harry. Once they stopped, and Eggsy saw the sign showing they were done ferrying for the day, he unyoked the brahmin and led her over to the troughs. He filled them without a word and gave her a rubdown. He went back to the cart when he was done, and saw Harry was still standing there and Fred-or-Ted was watching. Eggsy had just gone on autopilot once they’d stopped; he blushed brightly and went over to Harry.

“I didn’t mean to hold you up,” he said quietly.

Harry nodded once without saying anything to him. They had talked, somewhat extensively, on the road about how people would expect Harry to act toward his slave. As much as he loathed the idea of it, he understood; until they got that collar off of Eggsy, all anyone else would see was a slave. They didn’t need word to travel ahead of them that Harry wasn’t what he appeared to be. That could make entering Paradise Falls very tricky.

Eggsy climbed up onto the cart and picked up a bag of caps before following Harry over to Fred-or-Ted. Harry and the ghoul looked each other over coolly.

“Ain’t he Demetre’s?” His voice was rough and gravelly, a common enough thing among ghouls from the damage to their vocal cords.

Harry offered him a wan smile. “Demetre has ‘retired’.”

Fred-or-Ted gave Harry something of a knowing look. Slavers didn’t just give up their slaves when they retired; he assumed Demetre had retired to a shallow grave somewhere.

“He tell you how my brother and I do things?”

“For the most part. You bring caravans across during certain hours, a charge of 50 caps, and the campsite is there for overnighting.”

The ghoul nodded. “He tell you we do this _orderly_? You get here, I give you a number token; yours is five. We take three carts across at once. One of the caravans ahead of you is two carts, but you’ll still be on the second trip. Any fuckery and you find your own fucking way across. Understand?”

“Quite clearly,” Harry said coolly.

“And caps up front.”

“Oh, I think not.”

The ghoul scowled.

“Harry…” Eggsy began softly.

“I didn’t ask your opinion.” Harry eyed the ghoul for a moment. “I have _his_ word that you’re good for it, but you’ll excuse me if I doubt it, being both my first time coming this far west and it being only his word. You’ll get your caps, but once we’re on the ferry.”

The ghoul studied him for a moment. “Fine, for 75 caps.”

“Sixty.”

“Sixty-five.”

“Sixty-two.”

The ghoul shook his head at Harry’s audacity. The new ones _never_ tried this shit. Either he’d been a caravaner before or the slave had taught him well. “Fine. Sixty-two, payable once you’re on the ferry.”

Harry nodded and went back to the cart without acknowledging Eggsy. Eggsy followed him passively. They kept their back to the ghoul, although the others acted as though Harry was speaking to them.

“Did that go well?”

“Yeah. You’d’a known if it had gone bad.” Eggsy said, keeping his voice soft. “You played it well.”

He thought Harry wore it well, too. The quiet command he’d shown; his stern and almost stubborn manner. He knew better than to say it, though. It was never smart to tell a slaver - and he still couldn’t think of Harry as anything but, or himself as something other than Harry’s property - that anything they did was liked.

“You may tell me that once we’re on the other side.” Harry looked up at Cait and Alistair. “You two know your part.”

Cait nodded. “Yeah, playing the bodyguards and watching all night. He gets first watch.”

“When did I agree to that?”

Cait smirked and grabbed her bedroll. “Just now.”

Alistair watched her hop off the wagon and set up to sleep. He shook his head. “I think I’m only happy you didn’t leave her and Glory in charge.”

Harry chuckled. “Perish the thought. The world is in such shape that I doubt it would survive the two of them.”

“I can hear ya, ya fockers,” Cait yelled over to them with a laugh.

Eggsy laughed softly, briefly, before grabbing Harry’s bedroll and getting it set up for him. Harry was more than a little uncomfortable with it, but he watched as Eggsy worked. He looked, to Harry at least, like he was back on autopilot and just letting his hands do what they were supposed to without thought.

The fact that Eggsy seemed to be miles away mentally said a _lot_ to Harry. This was something he was safe in. His owners’ attention hadn’t been on him when he’d been making camp up for them. It was a place he could escape. And that made Harry want, all the more, to pull Eggsy away from the bedroll and pull him back into the moment. Because he _was_ safe now. Except he knew that would blow their cover, and Eggsy had been certain that would cause problems later. And Eggsy was the expert in this.

Eggsy went back to Harry once he’d gotten their camp set up, although he’d left Hamish and Daisy to take care of their own bedrolls. Harry eyed him and then pointedly shifted his eyes to Eggsy’s own bedroll, which was still in the cart.

“I’ll sleep in the cart,” he said quietly.

“Like Hell you will,” Harry said, his lips barely moving.

“Cait and Alistair will be around; they’ll keep an eye on me.”

Harry frowned. “That isn’t what I mean, and you know it.”

Eggsy shrugged slightly. “Slaves sleep in or by the cart, where the guards can keep an eye on them _and_ the supplies.”

“There’s nowhere else?”

Eggsy looked up at him, his face hiding anything he might be feeling. “Your bedroll.” He saw the slight twitch in Harry’s face and a secret smile showed for a moment. “Like I said, I’ll sleep in the cart.”

Harry watched him go over to the cart and climb inside. Either Eggsy didn’t use his bedroll or he only unrolled it once he was laying down. Everytime Harry realized something new about Eggsy’s life as a slave, it hurt and enraged him all the more. He wanted to hurt the people who’d done all of this to him, the people who’d taught Eggsy that this was normal, that this was deserved.

Eggsy slept easily in the cart, even if it wasn’t really comfortable. As much as he’d liked the mattress in Harry’s house, this was still so normal that he just drifted off in moments. He woke with the first light, a habit he hadn’t gotten out of yet. He went to the dying campfire and put a little fuel on it before putting something canned on to heat up. He wasn’t entirely certain _what_ it was; some meat thing from before the war. While it heated, he got the brahmin yoked and started breaking down camp.

As the passable breakfast finished, he dished some out and got a couple bottles of water from the cart. He brought it to Cait and Alistair - waking the later - first. He took care of the bedroll, and woke up Daisy for breakfast, and then Merlin. He let Harry sleep and finished breaking down camp, leaving the fire for last and leaving Harry’s breakfast warming.

Harry woke up not long after, the sounds and smells around him finally penetrating his sleep. He sat up, and Eggsy was right there with his food. Harry took it, looking around as he ate; he was more than a little surprised that everything was ready for them to go already. Merlin caught his eye and subtly nodded toward Eggsy. 

He frowned, not liking that, but waited until Eggsy had come back to dampen the fire and take his bedroll. “You didn’t have to do all of this.” He kept his voice low so it wouldn’t carry.

“Did I do something wrong, master?” Eggsy asked, pointedly meeting Harry’s gaze.

Harry clenched his jaw; he’d let Demetre and Vic die too easily. “No.”

Eggsy nodded and went back to the cart. He waited with the brahmin, stroking her neck and talking softly to her. He saw Harry go over to Hamish and the two of them started talking too softly for him to make any of it out. He knew they were talking about him, however; he could see them pausing every so often and looking over at him.

Alistair was keeping watch elsewhere, mainly focusing on the road behind them. Daisy and Cait were off doing… well, Eggsy didn’t know _what_. He’d assumed they were having an intimate interlude. Daisy had told him in Bunker Hill that he ‘wasn’t her type’; he’d taken that to mean ‘men’ and not ‘slaves’.

“Lee?” came an unfamiliar voice from behind him.

He whirled, having not heard the stranger approach. “Who are you?”

The stranger - a good looking man in his forties - frowned. “Apologies,” he said, looking over at Harry, who was approaching quickly, “I thought you were someone else.”

“Do you have some business with my slave?” Harry’s annoyance wasn’t feigned. Part of it was at this stranger who’d snuck into their camp, but the majority of it was at having to call Eggsy that. He would be so very glad when they were on the road again and he could drop this fucking act.

The stranger eyed Harry. “Oh? Does he belong to you?” 

“Yes. We’re waiting for the ferry, so what you want is unavailable.”

The stranger flashed an understanding smile and nodded. “I’m waiting for the ferry, myself. Why don’t we discuss this once we’re on the other side?”

Harry shrugged. “That will depend on my mood.” He took the brahmin’s lead from Eggsy. “Now if you don’t mind…”

“Of course, of course.” He left them and headed over to the ferry.

“I hope you realize,” Harry said in a low voice once the stranger was out of earshot, “that I have no plans on letting him do what he wants.”

“Yeah,” Eggsy said, no small amount of wonder in his voice. “He thought I was someone else though. So he might not want anything now.”

Harry nodded. He didn’t ask about the mistaken identity; it was something that happened at times. He would come to regret that decision.

03

They crossed the river without incident. The other two caravans they’d crossed with left them in a short amount of time, each taking a different route. And Harry was glad, so fucking glad, that they could drop the act.

“Eggsy,” he motioned for Eggsy to walk at his side, “thank you for today.”

“It’s… I just did what I was supposed to.”

“Yes, but you aren’t a slave anymore; this was just an act,” Harry reminded him gently. “So it’s appropriate that I express my gratitude. Now, why don’t you get in the cart and have a rest? You couldn’t have slept well.”

“I slept as well as I always had.”

“As well as the rest of us then.”

Eggsy walked alongside him for a few moments longer before nodding and getting up into the cart. He only dozed, letting Harry (and later Hamish) know when they needed to turn or where they had to leave the road for a bit.

They stopped for the day at a caravan stopping point. It had a huge lake just north of the road; a good spot for water and fish. There was already a fire going with what looked like a mole rat - a broodmother based on how huge it was - roasting over it. They paid it no real mind; it wasn’t an uncommon sight on a trading route to share the stopping point.

Harry unyoked the brahmin and helped Eggsy give her a rubdown. They were talking, quietly, about little things, mostly just making conversation to fill the silence. Even if it was mostly Harry talking while Eggsy offered a few words here and there.

“Harry.” Alistair sounded less than thrilled.

Harry looked over and frowned at what he saw. The stranger from earlier was at the fire, holding a bucket of water that he was carefully putting on the spit.

“Wasn’t actually sure I’d see you again,” he called over genially. “There’s more than enough of her if you want to join me. Better than the canned whatever your slave was making this morning, huh?”

Harry walked over to him. “Let’s cut the bullshit, hm? What do you want?”

The stranger smiled and stood up. “Glad you asked. I want to buy your slave.”

Harry was taken aback. He’d expected being asked to whore Eggsy out, not _sell_ him. “I think not. Slaves are hard to come by in the Commonwealth.”

“I’ll pay well. Whatever you’re asking. After all, you’re heading west and slaves are much more available that way.”

“I’ll pass.”

“One thousand, payable upon reaching the trading hub.” He paused. “I assume, based on the route, you’re heading to Be’ton.”

Harry shook his head.

“Five.”

Eggsy came over, staring at the stranger. “Five _thousand_ caps? For _me_?”

“Hush,” Harry snapped.

He looked at Harry with no small amount of wonder. Five thousand caps would take care of Zimonja’s needs for… well… maybe not forever, but for a long fucking time.

“Harry, I’m barely worth a thousand,” he said softly.

Harry looked at him with an expression Eggsy couldn’t place for a moment; he’d never seen it on a slaver’s face before. He’d _hurt_ Harry with that. Actually hurt him.

“He isn’t for sale.”

The stranger nodded. “I was afraid you’d say that. He’s obedient, well trained, and nice to look at. The perfect slave, assuming he isn’t averse to being used sexually.”

Harry sidestepped, putting himself between Eggsy and the stranger. “What he _is_ or _is not_ is my concern.”

The stranger spread his hands. “Hey, no problem. I had to try though.”

Harry turned to Eggsy long enough to motion to the cart. “An offer of five thousand is a little more than _trying_.”

The stranger offered a smirk and sat back where he’d been. “The offer of fill-ay de mole still stands.”

Harry took a seat. “I try to avoid mole rat, personally.”

“Stuff it with a couple tatos before you cook it. Makes it a lot more palatable.” He paused. “Tatos, too, somehow.”

Harry offered him a wan smile. “I’ll try to remember that.”

The stranger cut a strip off of the rat, studied for a moment, and cut a chunk off the rat. Harry could just make out one of the tatos inside of it. Harry watched, oddly fascinated, as the man cut chunks away from the bone, catching them neatly on a tin plate. Harry had never quite developed the ability to so neatly carve an animal still on the spit.

That kind of skill suggested some sort of training, either on animals or people. Vets and doctors were in short supply. Usual treatment was a stimpak or two; if those didn’t help, a bullet. Someone with actual training was too valuable a commodity to be just wandering.

“You’re wondering about my interest in your slave, aren’t you?”

“Among other things, yes.”

Such as _who_ trained this stranger and for _what_ purpose. Human experimentation was not outside the scope of reality. Harry knew about the synth research the Institute - rather, what remained of the Institute - was doing and about the Forced Evolutionary Virus, but he also knew that most of the experimentation was well hidden. Those incidents only came to light if a survivor escaped, and no one would miss a slave. Especially not the very well-paid owner.

“You’re a caravaner. That means you don’t have time to build up a client base. Someone like him? Could bring in a lot of money with that base. Someone like you needs more than just the one. Short time, high volume.”

Harry crossed his arms. “What an interesting sales pitch.”

“No, just some basic business.” He cast a glance at the wagon, where Eggsy and Daisy were talking. “Also, one slave to five of you. Boy’ll be one raw, exhausted bitch before you get halfway to Haven.”

“Such touching concern,” Harry said dryly.

The stranger looked at him and studied Harry’s face for several moments. “Or is it you don’t share him?” He sat back, nodding a bit to himself. “Yeah, that’s gotta be it. He must be one hell of a good fuck for you to pass up on so much money.”

“He is…” Harry paused, looking for an appropriate way to answer. “...exceptionally talented.”

The stranger laughed. “Yeah, he looks it. Where’d you pick him up?”

“From another caravaner.”

The stranger nodded thoughtfully, chewing on a bit of his mole rat ‘fill-ay’. “We’re both headed to Be’ton. Mind if I tag along? I won’t touch him, mind. It’s just safer, for me. Of course, I’ll pay you; 400 caps.”

Harry raised his brow at the offer. He didn’t exactly want the stranger around, but if it came to it, a simple glance and Alistair would kill him. If he _didn’t_ turn out to be a problem, once they parted ways, word could travel ahead of Harry about the ‘new’ slavers; single travelers often journeyed faster than the caravans, just because they could go more miles in a day than a brahmin pulling a wagon could. 

“Very well.”

Harry stood and took the tin plate with the chunks of meat over to the wagon. He handed if off to Daisy, who looked at it apprehensively. She gave it a cautious sniff.

“It doesn't _smell_ bad.”

“And when one considers the source, that is saying something, indeed,” Harry said. “Our new… friend… ate some and seems to have survived.”

Daisy picked up a chunk, holding it carefully between two fingers as if it was something more deadly than cooked meat. She took a very cautious bite of it, chewed for a moment, and then shrugged. “It’s not the worst thing I’ve had ever.”

Eggsy picked up a chunk and bit into it. “Mole rat’s always better than rad-scorp. Easier to get, too.”

“I dunno. There was this one trader who had a bunch of venom glands and made them into a pie. Said he learned it out west somewhere. I’d _live_ on that shit if I could.”

Alistair reached down from the cart, his eyes not leaving the stranger. He ate without even looking at the meat. “So.”

“He’s going to pay us 400 caps to let him walk with us to Be’ton.”

“He knows that doesn’t include Eggsy, I hope,” Daisy said with something of a dirty look in the stranger’s direction.

“Oh, I made him aware, yes.”

Alistair had made himself a pile of stones in the cart as they’d traveled; he picked one up and threw it to where Merlin and Cait were. It landed at their feet and was enough to get them to look over at him. It was easier, and stealthier, than shouting. He nodded toward Harry, and they both came over.

“Harry’s being vague,” was all he said when they joined the group.

Harry scowled at the sniper. “Sometimes needs must.”

Daisy crossed her arms and scowled at Harry. “Not when you’re letting someone tag along who wants to buy _my_ -.” She stopped, shifted her eyes to Eggsy for a moment, and then back to Harry. She’d gotten very protective of Eggsy, very quickly. “Someone who wants to buy Eggsy.”

“He knows Eggsy isn’t for sale or…” He waved his hand in a vague motion.

“For rent?” Eggsy offered.

“That, yes.”

“How’d you convince him of that…?” Eggsy studied Harry’s face for a moment. “Cos, well, pretty sure he figured out that I’m not… how’d he put it?... ‘averse to being used sexually’. At that point, it’s just figuring out an owner’s asking price.” He paused for a moment before continuing on helpfully. “You know, I can tell you what Demetre’s road rates for me were. They’re always higher cos there’s less options so it’s kinda ‘take what you can get and like it’ for clients. He’d only-”

“I told him I keep you privately,” Harry snapped finally.

It did one good thing, at least: it shut Eggsy up. Harry could only listen to him blithely go on about these things, as if they were perfectly normal and still to be expected, for so long. He might not have had such a problem listening when Eggsy opened up about these things, if Harry couldn’t _hear_ how much Eggsy was just trying to help him.

“You told him what?” Merlin asked, his voice low and sounding almost amused.

“I wasn’t expecting him to suddenly want to travel with us to the trading hub,” Harry said, not amused in the least.

“I _do_ have a clear shot,” Alistair offered.

“If it comes to that,” Harry said agreeably.

Eggsy smirked at him. “So ‘m I sleeping with you now?”

Harry couldn’t tell if Eggsy was amused, or trying to (forcibly, of course) flirt, or just make him uncomfortable. It _did_ have that later effect on Harry, who looked away. “Of course not. It’s… no more true than you being our slave.”

Eggsy looked up thoughtfully and tipped his head side-to-side slightly. To him, that wasn’t an act. He understood that they _wanted_ it to be, but he didn’t see it that way. “Yeah, but, there’s still having to act the part, yeah?”

Harry scowled at Eggsy; the smirk vanished and Eggsy looked away quickly. “Eggsy,” he started softly, “I didn’t tell him that to make you have sex with me. Surely, there has to be a way to act the part without…”

“Without fucking me,” he finished quietly.

It was gone like a flash, but Harry had seen the clear hurt on Eggsy’s face. How to even begin to explain to Eggsy, to make him able to even _see_ , that this wasn’t a reflection on him? That it wasn’t some commentary on Harry’s view of his worth? To make Eggsy see that he _cared_ about him, that they _all_ did, and that it could be fully expressed without climbing on top of him?

“I’ll think of something,” Eggsy said, his tone snapping back to something more cheerfully helpful.

 _Where does the act end?_ Harry wondered. _Does_ he _even know?_

04

Eggsy spent the night sleeping between Harry and Hamish. He’d dropped off almost instantly. For him, the oddity was in sleeping between two men who he considered his betters and not being expected to perform sexually. But he’d learned when he was still a child to sleep where he was uncomfortable and likely in danger. He didn’t sleep _easy_ ; he never did. He had simply learned to sleep when he could.

Harry, on the other hand, lay awake for hours. It wasn’t just the young man beside him, who was curled up somewhat protectively and occasionally talking in his sleep. Nor was it the _things_ Harry kept picking up when Eggsy’s words were loud enough. He’d spent enough time around Eggsy to know the general theme of the younger man’s night terrors. And it certainly wasn’t the thought of playing a role. He’d done that countless times.

It was the thought of this _particular_ role, done with someone so close by. He’d been aware - perhaps, in hindsight, only academically - that this could come up. The route Eggsy knew was the route he’d been taking for the last five years. There would be stopovers in places where he’d traded himself for caps, or lodging, or whatever else Demetre insisted upon. The people in charge of more than one of those stopovers had become very, _very_ familiar with Eggsy. The only way Eggsy had felt they would not be suspicious when he was no longer available for them would be to play himself off as Harry’s personal toy - a point that Harry had quietly verified with Cait.

But in those situations, it would have been an easy thing to play. Eggsy would have remained close at hand, although being mostly ignored. At night, they would have gone to a private room together. Any visual intimacy would have been assumed. Someone traveling with them, on the other hand, would have a very up close view of how the assumed master and slave interacted. Practically anyone else and Harry would be sleeping as easily as he ever did, because anyone else wouldn’t have that same training that Eggsy did; there wouldn’t be the risk of just pushing anyone else deeper into that mentality. 

“Daise.”

It was less a word and more a frightened whimper from beside him, and it yanked Harry out of his thoughts. Harry watched Eggsy for a moment, waiting to see if Eggsy had settled back down into sleep again. Eggsy jerked in his sleep, his hands coming up in a warding off gesture; Harry rolled close to him and shook his shoulder. Eggsy’s eyes snapped open. In the starlight and moonlight, Harry could see that they were wide and unfocused. Eggsy was awake, but just barely.

“Daisy’s fine,” he whispered.

“But-”

“She’s asleep, right there.” He pointed to her sleeping form. “The raiders are gone.”

Eggsy nodded. “Right. Fuckers.”

He lay back and was asleep again in moments. Harry knew Eggsy would say he didn’t remember what his nightmares had been about come morning. Harry had his own thoughts on the matter, and whether or not Eggsy actually forgot them by the time he was awake again, it seemed clear enough to Harry that Eggsy’s mind was starting to make connections, even if it was only subconsciously. Without the chems and the constant threat of abuse looming, Harry thought Eggsy was starting to remember being a child.

It added another level to Harry’s worry about this entire plan. Not that Eggsy seemed to be remembering, heavens no. He _wanted_ Eggsy to remember a life before everything went tits up. He just worried that Eggsy would remember _badly_ ; that somehow he’d associate remembering any of them with… he wasn’t even sure _what_ he was worried about there exactly, only that somehow it would make him more cheerfully submissive to them all. Or perhaps reinforce the idea that harm would come to Daisy over him.

He heard Eggsy start whimpering in his sleep again. This time, he didn’t shake him awake. Instead, he put an arm around Eggsy and held onto him. “You’re safe,” he whispered. “No one’s going to let anything happen to you.”

Harry whispered it over and over until Eggsy relaxed in his sleep, as much as he relaxed anyway. But the whimpering stopped and Eggsy stopped twitching in his sleep. Harry stayed against him, holding Eggsy protectively even as he started to doze off himself. His sleep was light, however, and when Eggsy’s nightmares returned, Harry woke up and whispered to him until they passed.

05

They continued on in the morning, the stranger walking beside the wagon but never riding in it. Harry had Daisy and Merlin lead so he could keep an eye on their new, temporary companion. He did _not_ like how often the stranger kept looking at Eggsy. Every so often Harry would realize that Alistair was watching him; and, despite _wanting_ to answer otherwise, every time Harry subtly shook his head.

They stopped at the halfway point between the campsite and Be’ton to let the brahmin rest, and while Eggsy was unyoking her, Harry went over to him. He kept his back to the stranger, keeping Eggsy from view. 

“Have you thought of anything?”

Eggsy turned toward Harry, looking up at him curiously. “Yeah, I said I would.”

“Good. He keeps-”

“Watching me, I know.” He put his hands on Harry’s shoulders, just high enough so they could be seen from behind Harry. “There’s a building up toward the lake. It ain’t in bad condition. It’s a bit back the way we came on that road that turns north.”

Harry didn’t like the implication of Eggsy knowing this spot, although he wasn’t really surprised. He stepped away from Eggsy and turned back toward the road. He caught Cait’s eye and nodded to her, letting her know they were off to do Eggsy’s… plan. Whatever it was.

He led Eggsy down the road, turning when Eggsy softly told him to. Harry could hear the quiet, but not quiet enough, steps of the stranger following them. Eggsy directed Harry to an abandoned building. It had been a modest home from the look of it, although part of the second floor was collapsed. There wasn’t much inside the house, just a passable bed in each of the three remaining rooms.

Eggsy guided Harry against a wall and went to unbutton his trousers. Harry stiffened and put his hands on Eggsy’s, pushing them away.

“This is an _act_.”

Eggsy nodded. “I ain’t stupid, Harry. But he’s following us. You really wanna bet he ain’t gonna come in here? I ain’t gonna touch you; don’t worry. I’m just gonna make it _look_ like I was.”

Harry nodded and let go of Eggsy’s hands, but finished unbuttoning his trousers himself. “You could have just said.”

“Yeah, sorry. I just…” He shrugged. “I forget sometimes that you don’t _want_ to fuck me.”

Harry gave him a concerned look. “You know that isn’t exactly strange, for people to interact without the assumption of fucking?”

“Not with me.” He shrugged again. “I mean, I get it. You don’t wanna so… you know, whatever. It’s just weird for me.”

Harry chuckled quietly. “So… you don’t plan on trying to force the issue, is what you’re saying?”

Eggsy blinked at him, not following his amusement. “Of course not.”

“Why?”

“Well…” Eggsy frowned slightly, as if he thought Harry was intentionally being obtuse. “It would be wrong…”

“But it wouldn’t be wrong for me to force you.”

Eggsy laughed softly and leaned against him, his hands going to Harry’s chest. “You wouldn’t have to force me, Harry. You’ve been so good to me; how could I tell you no?”

“Eggsy,” Harry said patiently, “that’s still forcing you. It’s something you’d be doing, well, out of gratitude because I’m not hurting you.”

Eggsy shook his head in confusion. “So?”

Harry signed. “What’s the difference in your mind, Eggsy, between you forcing the issue or my forcing it?”

“I’m a slave,” he said, as if it were perfectly obvious. “You aren’t.”

“No, you aren’t,” Harry said patiently. “I gave you the control device, remember? Until we can get the collar off of you. You’re not a slave anymore.”

Eggsy smiled as if they were sharing an amusing joke. “Right, of course.”

Harry stared at him for a moment. Eggsy thought it was all an act. That this was some game Harry liked playing for… whatever reason that made sense in Eggsy’s mind. “Eggsy…” he said softly.

“Whatever you want, Harry, I’ll always do it. You never have to force me. I’m _happy_ to do anything you need, or want.”

Harry sighed, but whatever he planned on saying was lost when they heard heavy footfalls on the stairs. Eggsy’s head snapped toward the door, even as he pressed against Harry, his hand slipping between them and inside Harry’s trousers, low enough to make Harry’s muscles jump but too high for any intimate contact. Harry could feel how tense Eggsy was against him, and after a minute, Eggsy started giggling softly and pressed his face against Harry’s chest.

“What?” he hissed.

“It’s just…” Eggsy whispered, trying to get his giggling under control. “Waiting to be, you know, caught in the act by that fucking weirdo.”

Harry laughed softly. “This was _your_ idea, not mine.”

“Well, I wasn’t expecting him to actually _follow_ us. I’m _improvising_.”

“Is that what you call this?”

Eggsy’s giggling was infectious and soon they were both trying to keep it quiet. Eggsy brought his hand up, so both were on Harry’s chest. He felt Harry’s hands on his arms as the older man leaned his head against his shoulder to try and stifle his laughing.

“He’s going to hear us,” Eggsy hissed.

“I thought that was the point of this.”

That got them both going all over again. It took them several minutes to get themselves under control this time. When they did this time, Harry gently pressed Eggsy away from him and, buttoning his trousers back up, he went to the door and looked out.

“Well, he’s gone at least.”

Eggsy snickered. “Who knew that’s all it took to drive a weirdo off?”

Harry nodded toward the door. “Let’s head back, then.”

“Yeah…” Eggsy bit his lip. “Just… one thing.”

Harry turned back to him, closing the door again. “What is it?”

“I…” He trailed off.

Harry watched him for a moment. Eggsy was afraid; Harry could see that plainly. He’d brought his shoulders in, trying to make himself smaller. His arms were crossed over his stomach, and he wouldn’t exactly look at Harry. Near, but not _at_.

“It’s alright,” Harry said gently. “Whatever it is, I’m sure it’s fine.”

“The woman who runs the Be’ton trading hub. She and Demetre had an arrangement.”

Harry fought to keep a frown from surfacing. “I assume she was given permission to do as she liked with you in exchange for something.”

Eggsy nodded. “She’d waive the trader’s fee, s’long as I spent every night with her. Even if we don’t trade…”

“She’ll still expect that.” Harry nodded.

“I didn’t think about it,” Eggsy said quietly. “It wasn’t a problem before.”

Harry went over to him and put his hands on Eggsy’s arms. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not mad that you didn’t think to tell me this before. Like you said, it wasn’t a problem with Demetre.”

“But it _is_ with you.”

Harry nodded. “Yes, but I’m not going to hurt you over it.” Although he wouldn’t mind a shot at the woman in question. “What about her?”

Eggsy shrugged. “She’s used to getting what she wants. She controls the hub. No one trades without her say so.”

Harry frowned slightly. “Can we detour around?”

“I don’t. I don’t _know_ another way.”

“Alright, that’s alright.” Harry said nothing for a moment. “If we keep this up, this… act where you’re my own private…”

Eggsy frowned a little. “It might work. I don’t know.”

“We’ll overnight at the campsite. That’ll make Be’ton our afternoon break, so we’ll only be there for a couple hours. Even if she takes issue with it, we should be able to find a way around easily enough without losing much time.”

Eggsy watched him expectantly for a moment. “That’s it…?”

Harry shook his head uncertainly. “What else is there?”

“Well…” He trailed off and shrugged. 

“You’re still worried that I’m angry?”

Eggsy nodded.

“I’m _not_ ,” Harry insisted gently. “At all.”

Eggsy looked up at him and watched him cautiously for a moment before smiling; it was a good act, but Harry could see it was forced. He put his hands on Harry’s shoulders and pushed up to kiss him. Harry stepped back before he could, and took Eggsy’s hands off of his shoulders with a gentle smile.

“Your offer is appreciated but unnecessary.” He paused and nodded toward the door. “We’ll head back and let them know we’re overnighting. Then tomorrow… we’ll deal with this woman.”

Eggsy nodded slowly. He didn’t understand, at all, why Harry was just… rebuking his offers. Yes, it was out of gratitude because Harry wasn’t hurting him. But why was that so bad? Why was it so bad that he would do whatever Harry wanted him to do? Most slavers would kill to have someone so willing to serve them.

He followed Harry out of the building and back to the camp. The stranger was back in the camp, and he watched them as they rejoined the others. Eggsy looked over his shoulder while Harry was explaining to the others what the plan was. He met the stranger’s gaze, and Eggsy wasn’t sure how to take it when the stranger smiled at him. It was an oddly gentle smile, sort of the way Harry smiled at him, and that scared him more than if the stranger’s look had been full of lust.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Courser finally tracks Eggsy to Zimonja.  
> Harry and the others arrive at the first major trading hub, and we learn what's up with the stranger.  
> Angst and shenanigans ensue, and I make fun of a couple game mechanics because I just had to.

01

“He had it done in three _hours_ ; you’ve been at it three _days_.”

James turned to the ‘woman’ beside him. ‘She’ was giving him a smug look from beneath ‘her’ bad wig. He raised the hammer in a mock threat.

“If you can get enough housing for twenty people up in three hours, Deacon, then fucking _do it_.”

Deacon shook his head. “Oh, no. Not me. The General did it. You should have seen him do it. She just took a bunch of crap she’d been gathering up, dropped it on the workbench, and boom! Instant walls. Instant floors. Instant fucking toilets. He had an entire settlement outfitted and ready to go in three hours.”

James just shook his head. No one could ever tell when Deacon was telling the truth or not, but _that_ was one of his more obvious lies. “Well, if you ever want to get us their secret building technique, I’m sure Harry would be more than appreciative. Until then, get a fucking hammer and help.”

Deacon shook his head, holding his hands out. “And wreck my nails?”

James looked over at him again, and then at Deacon’s hands, and then back to his face. “Your nails are all different lengths, one has a sizable crack forming, and there’s dirt under several of them.”

“Yes, and it took me _hours_ getting them to look this bad.”

Glory walked past Deacon, smacking him up the back of his head and knocking the wig off. “Pick up a fucking hammer.”

He sighed and went over to the toolbox as a yell came down from the sniper’s nest.

“Wanderer at 4 o’clock.”

Instantly, the three of them were on alert. They went to the gate and watched as the person approached. He was a black man with a tight, almost military looking cut. He wore all leather and reflective sunglasses. As he grew closer, Glory recognized the dour-faced man and grabbed her weapon.

“X6-88,” she said, a touch sourly.

“And that is?”

“Courser,” she answered. “Was assigned to work with the General, when they infiltrated the Institute that is.”

“Friendly?”

Glory scoffed. “Nope. He’s perfectly happy working to collect escaped synths.” She aimed her weapon at him, muscling bulging under the weight of the unwieldy minigun. “I wouldn’t mind putting a hundred or so rounds in him.”

Deacon did a double take. “Where were you hiding that?”

“Up my ass,” Glory said, rolling her eyes.

Just because Deacon hadn’t realized she’d left it sitting on some of the building materials hadn’t meant she’d been hiding it. How anyone could miss the 30 lb gatling gun was beyond her. Hell, they were the mounted gun of choice for vertibirds. Sometimes she had to wonder about Deacon.

He tilted his head a bit, eying her stance with the gun. “Well, it does look a bit like a strap-on from here…”

“Do you two _mind_?” James snapped. “We have a Courser coming down on us; this isn’t the time.” 

“What’re you talking about?” Glory smirked. “It’s the best time.”

“Maybe James needs a little sweet minigun time.”

“I’m going to shoot you both myself,” he muttered before pointedly ignoring them and yelling to the Courser. “Stop where you are. This is an Institute-free zone. Peaceful synths _only_.”

X6-88 did not stop right away, but came closer until he could call to them without having to yell. Why humans thought being twice this distance would do anything puzzled him. A bullet’s velocity was generally between 550 m/s and 1,250 m/s; being an additional six or seven metres back would change nothing.

“As long as I am able to complete my mission, I will be peaceful.”

Glory’s hand tightened on the trigger-grip. “ _Fuck_ your mission.”

“My mission does not concern you, G7-81.”

James could _feel_ Glory bristling at being called by her Institute designation. He put a hand out toward her in hopes of waving her down. “What _is_ your mission here?”

“Same thing their _missions_ always are: capture or eliminate an escaped synth.”

“She is correct,” the Courser confirmed. “We last tracked the movements of an escaped synth going by the designation of X-Z to Zimonja.”

Glory smirked at him. “Tell you what, X6: you give us his full designation, and we’ll happily hand him over to you.”

That seemed to throw X6-88 off balance. He said nothing for several long moments. This was not how the script went.

“The Institute is not certain which escaped X-series synth he is.”

“Well, that’s a bit disconcerting,” Glory said innocently.

The Courser didn’t answer her for a moment. “Fine. _What_ is?”

“Well, aren’t you X-series _all_ Coursers?”

He didn’t answer her, but somehow his already tight lights tightened further.

“If even _your_ series are jumping ship, maybe it’s time to just… walk away.”

“Where is the synth?”

James shook his head. “Eggsy _isn’t_ a synth.”

Glory made a mock disappointed sound. “But I was having fun with him.”

“He’s a former slave whose owner thought having a synth to whore out would be more exotic. He’s on his way to Paradise Falls now.”

X6-88 nodded and turned on his heel to walk away. He missed the teleporters of the Institute. Back in the day, he could have just signaled in and been gone in a flash. Now he had to waste time actually walking places.

“You realize he’s just going to go after them,” Deacon said.

Glory laughed coldly. “I’m just sad I’m not going to be there to see him try to get past Harry, Hamish, and Daisy.”

James smirked. “My thoughts exactly.”

02

It was just after midday when they came upon the Pre-War sign for Be’ton. The name had once been much longer, but bullet holes and two centuries of rust had eaten most of it away. It was how many places were renamed, by taking the worn-down signs and turning them into new words.

“We're about an hour out,” Eggsy said as they passed it.

“Daisy,” Harry said, without looking up at the wagon.

She hopped down, stumbled a little, and then grinned as she got her feet under her. She gave Eggsy a triumphant look. “For my next trick, I’ll learn how to climb it while it’s moving.”

Eggsy ducked his head, hiding a little smile even despite walking behind Harry. “Just don’t break your neck.”

“You didn’t,” she said, and sped up enough to take the lead from Harry.

Harry fell back to Eggsy, put a hand on his shoulder, and then slowed so they both fell back behind the wagon. He watched the stranger as the man watched them fall behind. He didn’t speak until he felt they were far enough back that they wouldn’t be overheard.

“Tell me about the woman.”

“Elena McKathy,” Eggsy began. “She basically runs the hub. Her family’s been here for something like three-hundred years. When the bombs fell, her family sorta… kept the town from falling apart, so they’ve basically been in charge ever since.”

“Essentially her own queendom.”

Eggsy nodded. “Nothing happens in the hub without her approval. Look, Harry, she ain’t… well, she don’t leave bruises. I can throw her a fuck so we can-”

“No.” Harry paused for a few moments. “I _do_ have an idea about how to get around her… arrangement with Demetre, assuming she still demands it.” He began to, somewhat haltingly, explain his idea. “We’ll… do like we’ve been doing. Play at you being my… toy. I get angry with you because… you haven’t told me about her arrangement. So I haul you into a room for the night, where… well… they think I’m beating and forcing myself on you.”

Eggsy looked up at him as he explained, a thoughtful frown on his face. “That might work. I mean, we can try it. If it goes south, I can always fuck her.”

“If it goes south, we’ll just leave. We have enough supplies to get us most of the way to the next hub. We’ll just have to be careful and hunt along the way.”

Harry nodded toward the wagon and started jogging to catch up, effectively ending the conversation and not allowing Eggsy to make his offer again. He knew the young man was just trying to be helpful, and in a manner that was normal for him; he was going to do everything he could to retrain Eggsy.

They got to the settlement; a decently large area surrounded by a well-built wall. Harry wasn’t surprised at the craftsmanship. They’d had two-hundred years to get it done proper, after all. The road from the gate was well maintained and led them to the pub the McKathy’s had run since before the war. Directly across from it was a long stretch of grassy area, surrounded on all sides by road and very patched buildings. There were hitches evenly spaced along the grassy area, and Harry could see a number of caravans trading with people who passed among them.

Harry brought the wagon over to the pub proper. He looked over at Eggsy, who nodded and ran up the stairs and into the building. He’d barely gotten through the door when a pair of hands grabbed him and pulled him aside. One of the hands then pushed him back against the wall before settling on his chest, while the other went between his legs and squeezed.

“I’d _wondered_ how long it would take Demetre to get back here,” Elena all but purred.

“Hello, Elena,” Eggsy said with a passable smile. “It ain’t Demetre anymore. He, um, he retired.”

“Mm, I see, I see. And does your new owner know about our arrangement?”

Eggsy shook his head. “No, ma’am. I tried to tell him but he said he’d work it out with you.”

She tightened the hand on his chest enough to pull him by the shirt and led him toward the door. He went along passively, but a bit tensely. He knew what was going to happen, and he’d agreed to try it, but he was still nervous.

Elena let go of him once they were at the cart. She saw the way Harry was eying her and smiled at him. “I take it you’re his new owner.”

Harry make a curt ‘come here’ motion and Eggsy went to him obediently. “I am. I take it you are Elena McKathy.”

She nodded politely. “Has he told you about the arrangement I had with Demetre?”

Harry looked coolly at Eggsy before turning his attention back to Elena. “No, I’m afraid he has not told me about that.”

“The trading fee is two-hundred caps for three days; one-hundred for every additional three days. I waived Demetre’s fee in exchange for total and unrestricted use of this lovely slave for the duration.”

Harry watched her for a moment before turning on Eggsy. Eggsy fell back a step, his eyes going wide. Even though he’d expected it, he’d forgotten how rapidly Harry could move. Harry grabbed him by the shirt and pushed him back against the wagon.

“Remember, you’re safe and this is an act,” he whispered so only Eggsy could hear. “Make sure she can hear you.”

“I’m sorry,” Eggsy moaned weakly. “I should have said something! I just. I forgot!”

“That was good,” Harry whispered gently. “Nothing bad is going to happen to you.”

Harry shoved him back again as he let go of Eggsy’s shirt and turned back to her. “I am… _unwilling_ to continue your arrangement.”

Her smile turned into something of a predatory smirk. “Oh, you’re possessive of things that are yours, hm? I’m going to have to insist on the fee then… and, mm, perhaps an extra hundred for dashing my weekend.”

Harry laughed softly. “Oh, you _are_ a minx. We’re only here until morning. A full three day fee for less than one day is perfectly fine. What is your fee for a room?”

“Ten caps a night.”

“For dashing your weekend, I’ll pay double _that_.” 

She shook her head and chuckled. “You are a one, aren’t you? Well, I can accept that.” She nodded her head toward the pub. “It’s the first door at the top of the stairs.”

“You may get your caps from my associate.” Harry motioned to Merlin and then started toward the pub. “Come along.”

Eggsy followed him into the pub and up the stairs. Once they were in the room, he shut the door and turned the bolt. “So now that we’re up here…” he started softly.

“Clearly, I’m hoping the implication I left her with is that I’m going to make you apologize to me in a very physical manner.” He looked around the room. There was a bed and a wardrobe. And that was it. “Obviously, that will not be happening, although we will have to leave any trading today in Hamish’s capable hands. Or Cait’s, as she’s traveled more recently.”

“That gives you and I the evening and night.”

Harry nodded, taking Eggsy’s meaning and passing it right by. “I figure we’ll stay up here until dark, and then I’ll send you for some food, which you’ll bring back here. I assume you’ve been hurt enough in your life to be able to fake an injured walk.”

Eggsy frowned for a second before nodding. “You want me to walk like you beat me. Yeah, I can do that.”

“Will my, as she called it, ‘possessive’ act keep her from touching you?”

Eggsy thought for a moment before shrugging. “She might still try. Want me to tell her that her touching me is part of what set you off?”

Harry smiled. “Yes, I think that will end quite the nice touch. Very good.”

Eggsy looked pleased by the smile and the praise. It was things like this which made him so willing to do anything Harry wanted. He still couldn’t fathom why Harry wouldn’t just… take advantage of that. Any other slaver would.

“May I ask you something, Harry?”

Harry nodded and motioned toward the bed. “If there were other seats in here, I would suggest them.” He sat on the bed and waited for Eggsy to join him. “What’s on your mind?”

“Do you… I mean…” He looked away, suddenly uncertain.

“Please go on,” Harry said after a moment. “You won’t be in trouble.”

“When we get to Paradise Falls… and after she’s dead… what do you plan to do? I know you’re bringing them back with you, but…”

“But do I intend to make them my slaves?”

Eggsy nodded without looking at him.

“No.” Harry said nothing for a moment. “I’m hopeful there’s something in Paradise Falls that will allow me to deactivate the collars. Those that are willing to come with us will be welcome and will be free to join us in Zimonja. Those that wish to remain in the Capital Wasteland, or somewhere along the way, will be well wished and allowed to leave.”

“Just like that?”

Harry nodded. “Just like that.” 

“And… me?”

Harry smiled softly and put his hand under Eggsy’s chin, guiding him to meet his gaze. “I’m going to take that collar off of you, and then I want you to go where you want. I know the other slaves were your family; stay with them if you want to.”

“What do you want me to do?”

Harry dropped his hand away from Eggsy and shook his head. “No. I’m not going to have you base your decision on what I, or _anyone_ but you, want.”

Eggsy gave him a truculent look that he didn’t quite feel. “Then I’m staying in the Capital Wasteland.”

“I expected you’d want to,” Harry said gently.

Eggsy eyed him for a moment. He didn’t know _why_ he was antagonizing Harry. “I’m gonna open up shop again, too. Gonna fuck my way across the Wasteland and make a ton of caps.”

Harry gave him a patient look. “Eggsy, if that’s really what you want. I suspect that it isn’t, but… I’ll hardly be in a position to stop you.”

“Jet and Med-X and shit like that’s real easy to come by in the Wasteland.”

Harry sighed. “Yes, I suppose it is.”

Eggsy said nothing for a few moments. Why didn’t Harry yell at him? Or threaten him? Or hit him? “You really ain’t gonna tell me what to do.”

“No.”

“ _Why_?”

Harry laughed softly. “Escaped synths are, in essence, runaway slaves. You’re aware of this, I believe.”

Eggsy nodded. “Yeah. What’s that gotta do with anything? I ain’t one.”

“I know.” He paused. “Hamish, Alistair, Daisy, and I - as well as a few others - are part of a Pre-War organization from across the sea. They were trapped here when the bombs fell, and have worked out of the Commonwealth ever since.”

“Okay…”

“Thirty or so years ago, we started working with an organization known as the Railroad. They find escaped synths, give them new memories and some plastic surgery before smuggling them out of the Commonwealth. Zimonja is the last stop before points north.”

Eggsy frowned, trying to follow this like a good student. He made the obvious connection, that Harry helped synth slaves get to freedom, but then he just… lost the point. Harry waited patiently as Eggsy forced himself to see the connection finally.

“You… you ain’t a slaver. You.” He paused. “You really. You really meant it when you gave me the controller. That, that I own myself now.”

Harry smiled. “Very good.”

“It’s… hard to believe.”

Harry nodded. “I know, and I fully expect you to have difficulty with it. You’ve been a slave for fifteen years.”

“Is that… is that why you’re good to me?”

Harry chuckled. “Yes, that’s why I treat you decently, as anyone deserves.”

“You’re _really_ fuckin’ weird, you know that?”

“In this case, I’ll take that as a compliment.”

03

It was mid-morning when they finally left the room. Elena was at the bar already, and she smirked at Harry as he walked by, Eggsy following behind. He had his arms crossed over his stomach and his head down, trying to keep up the act of having been beaten the night before. They found Merlin at the wagon, the brahmin already yoked and ready to go.

He raised his brow at Eggsy. “He alright?” he asked in a low voice.

“‘m fine,” Eggsy said quietly. 

“Where are the others?” Harry asked.

“About three caravans up. They just arrived; Alistair and Daisy wanted a look at their wares.”

Harry nodded. “I’d like to be off shortly. Be a dear and go get them?”

“If you’re going to ask like that, I suppose I can.”

They watched Merlin head up a few stalls to where the others were. Harry could only imagine what Daisy would end up coming back with. They spoiled her endlessly - mainly because they had lost Lee, Michelle, and Eggsy all in one night - and he had no doubt Alistair was buying her whatever it was that caught her eye.

“About to head out, I take it.”

Harry groaned internally and turned around to face their - hopefully _former_ \- companion. “Yes.”

“I just thought we oughta settle up.”

Harry quirked his brow. “I thought you settled up with Hamish last night.”

He smiled slowly. “I gave him the caps, yes.”

“Then what else-”

Harry cut himself off when the stranger brought up his gun. It was a .22. Harry had seen one identical to it before; it’d had an integrated silencer. Harry assumed it wasn’t just identical in looks, but also had that hidden feature.

“You should have taken the money when I offered it.”

Eggsy stepped between them, his hands up a bit. “Hey, look. Harry’s good with my going with you. Ain’t you, Harry? We talked about it last night.”

Harry’s lips pressed into a tight line. “I suppose I said something _similar_ to that.”

Eggsy nodded, giving the stranger a submissive smile. “See? Harry’s okay with it. So…” He stepped closer to the other man and put his hands on the stranger’s chest. “I’ll go with you. There’s no reason to threaten Harry.”

He shook his head in disbelief, but wrapped his free hand around Eggsy’s wrist, closing it like a vice on him. “Even after the beating you gave him last night - yes, I saw him hobbling around the pub - he’s still so loyal to you. You should be proud to have broken him so completely.”

He fired once and Harry looked down at the blood blooming on his shirt. Harry fell back against the wagon, his hand going to the wound as he slid down to the ground. Eggsy barely heard Merlin yell Harry’s name and was nearly jerked off his feet as the stranger started moving toward the gate. Eggsy didn’t fight, didn’t protest. Harry had already been shot over him; he didn’t want to give this man… to give his new master reason to kill someone else.

He looked over his shoulder as he was dragged away. Alistair and Merlin were on the ground with Harry while Daisy and Cait tore into the supplies in the wagon. He knew they were trying to save Harry, and that Harry was more important than he was, but… But he’d hoped that one of them - Daisy or Cait mainly - would have tried to help him. He wouldn’t have wanted them to be hurt; he’d just hoped they would have kept up the pretense of caring about him long enough to make an effort.

The stranger turned onto a side street and led Eggsy through what had once been an apartment complex’s lot. The building was somewhat intact, but trees had grown up through the broken pavement. He led Eggsy deeper into the woods, changing direction here and there. Eggsy got the sense that he knew where he was leading them, but Eggsy quickly lost all sense of direction or where the road would be. Eggsy followed him silently for hours, his wrist aching under the vice-like grip of his new master.

“You didn’t have to do that,” he said as the light started fading. “I really would have gone with you.”

He shook his head. “It never ceases to amaze me when slaves are so loyal. You don’t even sound afraid of him.”

Eggsy shrugged. “Harry was good to me.”

“Yes, I saw last night how ‘good’ he was to you.”

“You can let go of my wrist. I won’t try to run.”

“Bullshit,” he snapped.

“No, really. I won’t. I.” Eggsy sighed and started over again. “I have no idea where we are. And I’m not _from_ the Commonwealth. There aren’t things like this in the Wasteland. So I go with you or I die.”

The hand around his wrist loosened and, after a moment, fell away. “Fine.”

“Thank you, master,” Eggsy said quietly, rubbing his wrist.

“Dave.”

“Thank you, Dave,” Eggsy corrected.

It was almost full dark when a ruined cabin came into sight. Eggsy didn’t want to even step onto the porch, which canted at all angles. He felt an insane urge to laugh and bit down on it as he followed Dave into the ruined building.

Dave knelt and pulled up one side of a molding carpet. There was a hatch under it. He opened it and a light came on. “Inside,” he said.

Eggsy looked down the hole in the floor before getting on the ladder and climbing down. He hopped off at the bottom and stepped aside, looking up and expecting that his master had followed; he had not.

“There’s a button to your left. Push it.”

Eggsy did that and lights deeper in the bunker came on.

“I’ll be back shortly,” he said, shutting the hatch and sealing it.

Eggsy wandered deeper into the bunker. He found cans of food and cans of water. It was a nicely stocked bunker, and he assumed it was where Dave lived. There was a ham radio on a table. He thought about using it, but to call _who_? He sighed and continued his wandering, and found a couple bedrooms; he picked the one that looked more recently used. And then he realized he was crying.

“Fuck,” he whispered, wiping at his face. 

For the first time since leaving Vault 95, he wanted to be wrapped in the warm haze of the chems again. He wanted to feel little and care less, even while smiling. He knew he was going to be fucked and whored out; Dave had already made that clear. The chems would make that so, _so_ much easier.

He sighed, berating himself for crying. This was his life. This had always been his life. Harry and the others had just been a respite, a taste of what he _could_ have had once. He’d been stupid to believe it was over and that he could actually be free.

He went over to the bed and stripped to his skivvies before laying down and staring at the ceiling. He lay there, trying not to feel, until he heard the hatch open. He sat up, propping himself up on one hand. He licked his lips and left them parted. He assumed things would go easier for him if he acted the part of the 'perfect slave' his new master thought him to be.

“Get down in there.”

Eggsy started. He hadn’t expected Dave to come back with another slave. _How joyous_ , he thought and lay back again. He heard the pair walking back toward the bedrooms. He saw them in the door; they were all but shadows in his peripheral vision. 

“You drugged him, you _fuck_!”

Eggsy felt his blood run cold and he sat up. “Daise.” Her hands were tied in front of her, and she had a bruise forming on the side of her face. He looked past her at Dave. “Please, let her go. I’ll be perfect, I swear. I’ll never fight, or complain, or anything.” He scrambled off of the bed and went over to them and went to his knees. “I’ll fuck who and when you say to! I’ll smile, I’ll beg you for it! I’ll never try to run!”

“Get up, Gary.”

Eggsy got to his feet, all but bouncing up. He kept his head down, but frowned after a moment. Dave had called him _Gary_. He looked up at Daisy and she shook her head slightly. Dave didn’t seem to notice and he pushed her into the room.

“I noticed you two hours ago,” he said to her. “I’m going to leave you down here and lock the hatch when Gary and I leave. I’ll leave a signal on so associates of mine can come let you out. But by then, Gary will be long gone and you’ll never see him again.”

“She’ll make a lousy slave,” Eggsy said quickly. “She’s too willful and too hot-headed. She’s really too old to learn better.”

Dave looked at Eggsy for a moment. “My associates are going to release her, not enslave her. She’ll be perfectly safe.” He scowled. “Although I won’t deny the thought crossed my mind.”

“ _Fuck you_ ,” she spat at him. “And don’t you think for one fucking minute that I won’t track you down and blow your head off.”

Dave chuckled. “My dear child, I learned how to evade people before you were even born. The only reason you followed us this far was because I _let_ you.”

“Suck a cock, motherfucker.”

“Don’t think I never have,” he said. “Come along, Gary.”

“How do you even know that name? Did you know him in Paradise Falls or something?”

“Paradise,” he whispered and then nodded. “So Harry isn’t the one who broke you.”

“Of course not, you numb fuck,” Daisy snarled. “Harry _loved_ him!”

Dave rolled his eyes. “Oh, yes. I could tell by the way Gary was limping.”

“It was an act,” Eggsy said quietly. “We wanted Elena to think Harry was a possessive master who didn’t share his kept toy. He never laid a hand on me. Ever.”

Dave eyed Eggsy suspiciously. “That doesn’t mean he loved you, Gary. Slavers don’t love their slaves. Ever. Some of them might _claim_ to, or say that they’re just doing it for your own good.”

Daisy watched him without mounting disbelief. And then she heard Eggsy laughing bitterly. “Oh, my fuck,” she whispered.

“You were a slave,” Eggsy said. “Buy your freedom or escape?”

“Escaped,” Dave said. “Got a barcode on the back of my neck. We all do.”

“You’re a synth,” Daisy said. “You’re a motherfucking _synth_. Who got you out of the Commonwealth?! Who the _fuck_ helped _you_?”

“His name was Lee.”

The color drained from Daisy’s face and she mouthed the name.

“That’s what you called me before.”

Dave nodded. “You were only three or four at the time. The first time I saw you, I thought you were him. As I got closer, I realized you couldn’t be, but that you looked enough like him to be his son.”

“...and that’s how you know my name.”

Dave nodded again. “That’s right. Your dad helped me escape the Institute.”

“You stupid fucking-” Daisy launched herself at him, hitting at him with her bound hands and sobbing. She sank down and felt Eggsy’s arms around her; she leaned into them.

“She’s sorry. She _is_.”

Dave looked down at them, and how Eggsy was shielding the girl. “I’m not going to hurt her, Gary.”

“His name is fucking _Eggsy_ now,” she shrieked.

“Do you _like_ being called that?” He crouched beside them. “Is there another name you’d like instead? Your dad helped me with mine. Synths don’t have names, just numbers.”

“Yeah, I know,” Eggsy said quietly. “That’s how I got this name. Demetre… the guy who owned me before. The guy who owned me last. He thought he could get more money if people thought I was a synth. So. X-Z.”

Dave shook his head. “Yeah, there’s people who think there’s something… exotic maybe, about sleeping with a synth. Gen 3s like me are indistinguishable from humans, though. Unless you cut us up.”

“You can call me whatever you want to,” Eggsy said with a shrug. “Ain’t like I get a say in the matter, right?”

Daisy laughed against him, although it was nearly a sob. “Oh, no, no, no. You get to pick, right, Dave? I mean, you were just trying to pay dad back, right? You see a big bad slaver and decide ‘hey, maybe I should just fucking shoot him while I make off with the son of the man who set me free’. Then you can set _him_ free, right, Dave?”

“Daise,” Eggsy said softly.

“Well, guess what, asshole? That’s kinda why Demetre’s dead. Harry saw Eggsy and recognized him and decided that fuck needed to die. Cos they’d lost Eggsy all that time ago and thought him dead, or hoped, or I don’t even know. And Harry snapped a little when he saw his best friend’s son in a fucking slave collar.”

It was Dave’s turn for the color to drain from his face. “...his what.”

“What, is the idea of a fucking _friend_ that fucking foreign to you?”

“...I didn’t know. Lee, his wife, and Gary were the only ones I ever met.” He shifted so he could sit on the floor. “But you aren’t wrong about my motivation. How was I supposed to just leave his son with someone… someone like I thought Harry was?”

Daisy didn’t say anything, she just pressed her face against Eggsy’s chest. _Was_. Like Harry _was_. Harry had been one of her dads. And yes, she understood his motives; he’d killed Harry for the same reason Harry had killed Demetre and Vic. It didn’t _change_ her pain or her anger.

Eggsy held her silently as she cried against him. Dave left the bedroom and went into the other room. Eggsy could hear him calling out on the radio in code, but that didn’t hold his attention. Daisy had said something that had been circling in his mind ever since: pay dad back. She’d called his father hers, and he wasn’t even sure if she’d realized it.

He stroked her hair, wondering if there was any way she _could_ be his sister. It had been dark, and he’d been terrified. His mother’s blood was all over him, and his baby sister had been crying. And then just… gone. Her being dead wouldn’t have been the first thing his owners had ever lied to him about.

_I know the other slaves were your family._

_I’m not going to have you base your decision on what I, or_ anyone _but you, want._

He realized Harry must have told them not to tell him. It was smart, really; he would have just taken it as a threat. And they really wouldn’t have said anything. They would have just… let him leave if he’d wanted to.

He’d never thought that might have been painful for Harry, or any of them. And Harry had died thinking that Eggsy was going to leave them. He tightened his hold on Daisy without thinking about it.

“You okay?” Her voice was muffled and she still sounded like she was crying.

“Yeah.”

He wanted to tell her what she’d said, but he couldn’t. Not now. If Harry had gotten her to agree to not tell him, he didn’t think she’d take it well that she’d ‘failed’ him. He leaned his head against hers and just held her.

He didn’t know how long it had been when Dave rapped on the doorframe.

“I’ve got a contact that lives just outside of Be’ton. I got… his wife or girlfriend; I don’t know their voices well enough to be sure which is which.” He stopped and shook his head a little. “Sorry, rambling. Last she knew, your friends were still there. But he’d seen a Courser heading toward town and went after it.”

“Son of a motherfuck,” Daisy muttered against Eggsy’s chest. She leaned back; her face was puffy and she’d still been crying. “They sent one after Eggsy. We hadn’t heard more about it after we’d gotten him away from those assholes.”

Dave pressed his lips into a line. “Not good, especially not if they think he’s an X-series.”

Daisy scoffed. “Yeah, because there are _so_ many Coursers fleeing the Institute.”

“No, not many, but enough.”

That piqued her interest. “ _How_ many?”

Dave looked at her for a minute before shrugging. “Five of us, last I knew. It’s not easy for us to...” He shook his head.

Coursers were put through strenuous physical and mental training, AI alterations, and heavy brainwashing. They were stripped of their emotions and turned into effective killing machines. He’d had to learn _how_ to feel again before he’d been able to even question the Institute. Of course, learning to feel had brought on the ‘malfunction’ that made synths try to run away and want something more than to be a slave.

He knew the designation and face of every synth he’d brought back. They’d had their memories wiped and were reset. If they ran again, or showed signs of ‘malfunctioning’, they were killed. He had more innocent blood on his hands than he could ever wash off.

“We’ll head back to Be’ton at dawn,” he said. “Once we’re close, we’ll split ways. You both head toward the town, but keep him out of sight. I’ll. I’ll reactivate my chip.”

“Your chip…?” Eggsy asked.

“Each Courser has a chip in their brain that sends out a signal. It lets us keep track of each other and, before the General blew it up, we could teleport to and from the Institute using it. If they’re looking for a rogue Courser, it’ll send them right at me.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Daisy said quietly.

“Yeah, I do.” He laughed quietly. “I’ve kept them off my ass for some twenty-odd years. I know how to evade them.” He shrugged. “Get some sleep. I’ll wake you before dawn.”

04

They kept a rapid pace on their way back, and Eggsy stuck close to Daisy, to his _sister_. His baby sister. His _dead-because-of-him_ baby sister. He was still wonderstruck by it, although it made him understand more fully why she’d left one of her dads to save him; they’d already lost each other once.

Dave stopped once they were close enough to make out the wall around Be’ton from their cover. “Go toward the gate, but stay to the side. Once you’re close, I’ll activate my chip.”

Daisy nodded and made a soft sound of acknowledgement. “Look.” She sighed. “I hate you, okay? You killed Harry, and I’m never going to forgive that. But. Stay safe, okay? Don’t let him catch you.”

“I don’t plan to.” He nodded toward the wall. “Go.”

Daisy stepped out from their cover. “Stay behind me.”

Eggsy stayed behind her as they approached the wall. He kept his head down and stayed far enough back that he would seem like he belonged to her. Hopefully the Courser didn’t know his face. He wasn’t sure what they would do to him once they realized he wasn’t one of them, or at least didn’t react like one.

They were a dozen or so feet from the gate when X6-88 ran past them. Daisy sucked in a breath when he ran by. She knew his face. One of the benefits of the General having infiltrated the Institute: the Railroad all knew X6-88’s face.

She didn’t let that breath out until she heard his footfalls well behind them. “He’s after Dave,” she said quietly.

They hurried into the town. They could see where barriers had been hastily constructed and the damage from the firefight. They looked around slowly, looking for any sign of Cait or Hamish or _anyone_ they knew. They did notice a surprising lack of corpses, however. Either X6-88 hadn’t killed many people or he’d held back enough in his search for the rogue X-series synth.

“Daisy! Eggsy!”

They barely had time to register Cait’s voice when she collided with Eggsy and held onto him.

“I was sure we’d lost you both.”

Eggsy looked down at the arms around him, even as Cait pressed against him from behind. It took him a moment to register that it wasn’t a sexual embrace; he just wasn’t accustomed to that. He put his hands on her arms and leaned back into the embrace, marveling at the idea that he was cared about.

“I was kinda sure of that, too,” he admitted shyly.

“How’d you get past him? He was looking for _you_.” She let go of him and guided him to turn around and face him so she could look him over.

“Well, he, um. He was a synth, a Courser. The, uh…”

“The man who took him,” Daisy supplied.

“Yeah. He helped us get back and then activated his chip so that one would be able to track him.”

Cait looked between them, a wary look on her face. “Why would he do that after everything he did?”

Daisy looked at the ground. “Cos Eggsy’s dad rescued him from the Institute. He. He thought Harry.” Her breath hitched.

Cait nodded in understanding. “Come on. Let’s get you both inside.”

She led them over to the pub. Alistair was up on the roof over the entrance; he jumped down when they were close, landing neatly on the porch. Daisy had to wonder why the sniper hadn’t just taken the Courser out.

“They’re inside,” he said.

Cait motioned for them to head on inside. Daisy went, giving Cait a curious look as she went up the steps, and Eggsy right behind her. They got inside and saw Merlin standing beside a man in a chair.

Daisy’s eyes widened. “Harry?!”

He was pale, but it was certainly him. She pushed past the other patrons and rushed over to him. Eggsy followed in her wake, but slowly. She all but fell on him, holding onto him tightly and crying against him.

He put his arms around her. “Shhh, it’s alright. A couple stimpaks and a trip to the local physician, and I’m fine.”

Eggsy laughed softly. Harry was slurring slightly. “Yeah. That and how many Med-X?”

Harry bristled slightly. “How dare you.”

“Two,” Hamish said with a smirk, a hand going to Harry’s shoulder.

Harry sighed as if he was greatly put out. “I’ll have you know that having a bullet removed is _not_ a pleasant sensation.”

“No, I bet it ain’t.” Eggsy went over to him and knelt at his side. “Glad you’re not dead.”

“As am I. Now if only I could get Merlin to stop mother-henning me.”

Merlin offered Eggsy a clearly forced smile. “It’s the Med-X talking. That would be Harry’s… private name for me.”

Eggsy grinned. “Cute. Pet names for each other. What’s his?”

“Pain in the ass.”

“Oh, yes,” Harry said as if realizing something. “We _are_ in mixed company, aren’t we?”

“Eggsy, help me get this tosspot back to the wagon.”

“I am no such thing.”

Eggsy snickered and helped him get Harry to his feet. They each put one of Harry’s arms over their shoulders and helped him outside. Cait and Alistair met them at the wagon and helped them get Harry up and into it. Eggsy climbed up and got him set with a bedroll to relax on and another couple to lean against.

“Perhaps I should get shot more often,” he said with a drunken giggle.

“You know all you ever have to do is say the word,” Eggsy said quietly.

Harry’s hand shot out and grabbed Eggsy’s own. “No, no, I don’t mean it like that. I would never want-”

“Yeah, I know,” he said softly. “You ‘n’ my dad were friends.”

Harry’s eyes narrowed. “Who told you that? Which fuck told you?” He tried getting up, but Merlin tugged on the lead and the brahmin started moving; Harry fell back against the bedrolls again. “I told them to keep it a secret until after Paradise Falls. Now you’re not going to leave, are you? Now you feel like you _have_ to stay with us, don’t you?”

“Dave. The guy who’d been with us, who shot you, who was actually a synth. Dad got him out of the Commonwealth when I was a baby. He thought… Well, he bought the act.”

Harry nodded in drunken understanding. “Ah, yes, and he couldn’t very well leave you like that. At least you’re back with us. But now you must forget what he said about Lee. At least until after you've left us. Like you wanted to.”

Eggsy laughed. “Harry, I was coming back with you. I’d already decided that.”

Harry was quiet for a few moments, as if processing what Eggsy said was difficult. “Oh. Well then, I suppose you don’t need to forget.”

“Shut up, Harry,” Daisy ordered. The way he was going, he was liable to tell Eggsy who she was. It wasn’t that she didn’t want him to know. She just wanted to be the one to tell him.

“You know, another dose’ll probably knock him cold until tomorrow.”

Cait laughed. “Oh, and ain’t _that_ tempting. I wouldn’t have thought he was such a chatty drunk.”

“Fuck you all. I am _not_ a ‘chatty drunk’.”

“What’s the next major stop, Eggsy?” Merlin called back to him.

“Haven,” he answered. “It’s five days out. There’s a few villages here and there, but there’s mostly a whole lotta nothin’ between now and Haven.” He paused. “Well, I mean, there _probably_ is, but nothing Demetre ever went to.”

Merlin nodded, although he wasn’t certain Eggsy would even see it. Five days would give Harry plenty of time to recuperate. With it being a caravan route between hubs, he assumed that the roads would be clear. Well, as clear as roads would be.

Hopefully, they wouldn’t run into anything too major along the way.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A raider attack on the road leads to some sibling bonding time as they make their way to the Capital Wasteland.

01

They’d been on the road for two days before Merlin let Harry do something other than ride in the wagon. And he’d only allowed it after their midday stop, when Harry had begun - rather loudly - talking about how much better he felt. Eggsy had alternated sitting with Harry and keeping him company while Merlin led and walking alongside Daisy while she led.

They were only an hour or so away from the next campsite when Alistair paused in his constant scanning of their surroundings. “Raiders,” he said as he fiddled with the dial on the binoculars. “Maybe a dozen.”

He knelt down on one knee in the wagon and picked up his rifle. The raiders stood out clearly in the night vision scope. “Yeah, just about,” he noted as he took aim at the leader. And then he waited.

Even as he’d knelt, the others - with the exception of Eggsy - had started to move. Harry and Merlin took up positions at either end of the wagon, while Cait and Daisy hunkered down with Alistair. Eggsy stayed by the brahmin.

“There’s another gun in the wagon,” Merlin said quietly.

“Yeah, I know…” Eggsy also knew better than to touch a weapon. Slaves do not touch weapons. Not if they know what’s good for them. 

Merlin didn’t push beyond the offer. They had numbers enough, five of them to a dozen raiders. He knew once Harry gave the order, Alistair could take down most of them before they even came in range of the rest. Harry gave the order once they were all in position and Alistair began firing.

“Eleven… Ten…. Nine… two’ve broken rank and run…” Alistair said, keeping up commentary as they fell. “Hold up. One called a halt; they might retreat.”

“Yeah, and me mum’s descended of Brian Boru,” Cait quipped.

“They’re arguing,” Alistair said, ignoring her. He lowered his aim just a few degrees and fired again. He hit his target, the ground only a few feet in front of the new leader, and then readjusted his aim. He watched for a moment; the new leader’s morale was apparently not yet broken and he broke into a run again. “Idiots,” he sighed before firing again. “And they’ve scattered.”

He lowered the rifle long enough to eject the mag and slam a new one home. Cait took the clip and refilled it. “I’ll keep watch. They might find their balls again. Keep watch on the other side, your highness.”

“Fuck you,” Cait said mildly as she grabbed his binoculars and started watching the other side.

Daisy hopped off of the wagon and nodded at it to Merlin. She took the lead and got the two-headed cow moving again. Eggsy walked alongside her, as she expected him to.

“You could have taken the gun,” she said quietly. “You probably… got in trouble for that before, huh?”

“Couple times, yeah.” He shrugged. “Learned my lesson though.”

“What if Harry said it was okay?”

He looked at her askance. “Right, because giving a slave a weapon is a good idea. No, you beat the fuck out of them for even asking.”

She frowned thoughtfully. She got it, she really did. Eggsy had been a slave for most of her life and taught in very brutal ways. “What if… what if I told you to ask him? Then it would be my fault, yeah?”

Eggsy shook his head. “No, ain’t doin’ that to you.”

Maybe if she hadn’t slipped, maybe if he hadn’t found out she was his long-thought-dead, I-didn’t-kill-her sister. Cos if _she_ knew, _Harry_ knew. And if Harry found out that _he_ knew… how long would it be before he’d slap a collar on Daisy to keep him in line? He looked down at the ground, his hands seeking the shelter of his pockets. It was all well and good for Daisy to trust Harry, but how was he supposed to trust Harry when he’d so painfully learned the danger of trusting?

She wanted to just blurt out that she was his little sister, that Harry knew, and that Harry hadn’t tried to use that against Eggsy. She hadn't realized that, in a moment of extreme distress, she’d slipped. She knew how it had been used in the past, how any connection had been used against him. She knew how afraid he’d be if she told him. And so she just sighed quietly.

“Okay,” she conceded, for the time being at least.

She was going to find a way to get a gun into his hands. It wasn’t that they needed the extra gun; Eggsy needed to be able to defend himself. What if she wasn’t there when a danger came? Raiders or deathclaws or fucking yao guai or a hundred different things that would try and kill whoever they came across.

They’d been walking in silence for several minutes when Daisy took Eggsy’s hand. He startled and looked at their linked hands, and then cast a quick, somewhat panicked look over his shoulder. Harry seemed perfectly oblivious to the showing of affection.

“Daise,” he hissed with a pointed nod at their hands.

“What?” she asked with perfect innocence. “Two people who care about each other can hold hands, and I care about you.” She paused and then loosened her hold. “You don’t though, do you? That’s okay!”

“No, I _do_ care about you,” he said quietly, tightening his own hold. “But Harry…”

“Harry can’t see it,” she said quietly. “And even if he can, it’s okay. You can tell him, honestly, that I did it. I know you’re not my type and you know it; who says _he_ does?”

Eggsy eyed her for a moment. “So… he don’t know about you ‘n’ Cait…?”

“Me and…?”

She stopped herself, her eyes widening a bit. Cait was forty-four; she was seventeen. Sure, age didn’t really matter so much in the wasteland; too many things were always trying to kill you. If you were all adults - and Daisy was - then bully for you. But there was also the fact that she barely knew Cait, and that was something that mattered to her a _lot_ more than how close in age her adoptive fathers were to Cait.

“No, Harry doesn’t know about me and Cait,” she said with a grin. It wasn’t a lie, not exactly. And if it helped him feel more at ease, then it was a good.... misdirection for now. “I don’t know how you saw it, but… it can be our little secret, yeah?”

He shrugged a little and said nothing for a moment. He looked down again, but Daisy could see that he was grinning and just trying to be secretive about it. He squeezed her hand. “Yeah, it can be our secret.”

02

They stopped for the night in the campsite Eggsy had led them to. It had been an actual camping ground before the Great War, and Daisy felt they were in luck. Because the Great War had brought all of society to a standstill, things like trash weren’t picked up. So some of the trash from the campers - cans and bottles - was still laying around. Some of them were fresher, she knew that, but either way: there was a glut of them.

“Eggsy,” she called over to him once the brahmin was unyoked and fed, “can you get me, mm, like twenty of the empty cans and bottles?”

He nodded and got a box from the wagon. It was an odd request, but he wasn’t going to tell her no or question it. Not with Harry there, at least. Maybe later he’d ask her what she wanted them for, if it didn’t become apparent.

“Ha-a-mish,” she half sang at him, using her sweetest voice. “Could I borrow your gun? For target practice. For me. Not Eggsy, no, no, no. He knows that’s _wrong_ and he shouldn’t touch a gun. And he wouldn’t want to make Harry mad.”

Merlin and Harry exchanged a knowing look. She wanted the second gun specifically so Eggsy could learn.

“You could take Alistair’s handgun, couldn’t you?” Harry asked.

“Sure, I _could_ , but I’m taking _my_ gun. Why would I need a shotgun _and_ a 10 mil when I could have a shotgun and a plasma gun?”

“Oh. Right. Because it’s just you doing the target practice, and a plasma gun is just so different,” Harry said, not without some sarcasm. 

“It’s like half the weight of my gun,” she said, fully aware that Alistair’s gun weighed less than Merlin’s own.

Harry rolled his eyes and shook his head and Merlin snorted laughter. He drew his gun and offered it to her. Daisy grinned at them and took the gun. Part of it was for Eggsy, yes, but plasma guns were _so_ rare, and Merlin was very… _Merlin_ about letting anyone so much as touch his little tech toys. She almost never got to practice with it.

She grabbed a couple extra clips and jogged over to where Eggsy was waiting with the box of cans and bottles. She looked in the box and then grinned up at him. 

“We’re gonna go back a bit,” she called to Harry. “And I need Eggsy to come with me so he can set up my targets for me.”

“That’s fine,” Harry called back to her. 

She put Merlin’s gun in the box and took Eggsy’s hand, leading him at something just slower than a jog back where they’d come. They’d passed a fence not far back and she slowed when they got to it.

“How many do you want?” Eggsy asked her.

“Mmm, let’s start with five.”

He set up five of the cans on the fence and went back over to her. She picked up the plasma gun, bounced back and forth on the balls of her feet, and then aimed at the one in the center.

“Do it,” she whispered at the gun and fired it.

A bolt of green energy shot out from it. She knew it was superheated something-or-other. Merlin could have told her what (again) but she didn’t really care. All she cared about was what happened when it hit. The can went flying and she followed it with her eyes. It landed in the dirt and she pouted at it.

“Or don’t,” she said to the gun. She held it out to Eggsy. “Your turn.”

Eggsy shook his head. “No, if Harry-”

“Harry isn’t gonna come check on us,” she promised. “And… it’ll be another secret. You’re not telling him mine, and I’m not telling him yours.”

He looked down and away, and she knew he was grinning again. He got so _shy_ when he was happy. But it made sense to her, given how he’d grown up. “I don’t know how,” he said softly.

“I know! I’m gonna teach you.”

He looked at her and she saw just a hint of the grin still. She wanted to push more, but she didn’t want to scare him. Or make this just One More Thing someone forced on him. He watched her for a moment more, her big, wide eyes and her hopeful look, and then he nodded and took the gun from her.

“Okay…” he said quietly. “Show me.”

She helped him get into a good stance and aim. “Okay, you see the tabbish thing with the glowing circle in the center? That’s your sight. Get a can inside that.” She let him adjust his aim. “Okay, now just pull the trigger. It’ll feel a little warm as it fires, but that’s normal cos it’s super-heating the cartridge.”

He hesitated and then pulled the trigger. The green bolt shot out of it but the can didn’t go flying. Instead, it melted into green goop that slowly dripped down the fence railing. “Shit. Sorry. I didn’t… I don’t know how…”

She giggled and jumped up and down. “Yes! That’s what I wanted!” She grinned at him. “They do that sometimes. Turn whatever they hit into goo. I’ve seen it a couple times on raiders. It… well, it’s not pretty, but it’s still fucking spectacular.”

“So… that’s a good thing then.”

“Yep! It just happens sometimes. I’m not really sure how.” She bounced on the balls of her feet. “Hit another one!”

He laughed softly, dipping his head shyly; her excitement was infectious. He aimed at another one and shot again. This time the can went flying and landed on the road. He shot three more times, only missing one of the cans.

“That’s great!” She paused. “Okay, cos these aren’t bullet-bullets, it’s okay to do this while the cartridge isn’t empty. There’s a button on the side just a bit under the trigger. You see it?”

He turned the gun to one side and then the other. “Yeah.”

“‘Kay, press it and the cartridge'll pop out.” She waited until he did that. “See the bottom of it? That green crap inside it? That’s your ammo. So long as there’s that crap in it, you can use it. Now just slap it back in and you’re good to go.”

He nodded and looked at her holster. And the gun in it. “So… what about that kind?”

She let out a little squeal, took Merlin’s gun from him, and put it back with the targets. She took her own out of her holster and held it out for him to look at. “This is my _baby_. Modded it to fuck and back by myself,” she said proudly. She turned it this way and that as she told him about it. “It’s a combat shotgun, short stock and barrel, quick eject drum mag, same kinda sight Merlin uses, and a fucking silencer so fuckers can’t hear me shootin’ at ‘em.”

“You sure you’re okay with-”

She held it out to him. “I trust you, and I trust you with her.”

He took it from her. It was noticeably heavier than the plasma gun. Daisy got five more cans and set them up, giggling at the remains of the melted can. She went back to him and watched him aim. She helped him adjust his stance so the gun wouldn’t recoil so badly.

“Okay, now, mine has one fuck of a kick to it, so don’t lock up.”

He fired at the first can, and he didn’t even see where it went; he’d been too busy dealing with the recoil to pay attention. She hadn’t been kidding about it. “Fuck,” he hissed. “How do you even deal with that?”

She grinned and took the shotgun from him. She aimed and fired, hitting one of the cans dead on and controlling most of the recoil. “ _Lots_ of practice.” She paused and eyed Merlin’s gun again. “You know, that’s got another twenty-five shots,” she half-sang to him.

He eyed the gun and the targets left in the box.

“We could set them all up and see who can hit more.”

He snorted a laugh. “That’s easy: you.”

“Yeah, probably,” she agreed. “So let’s see how many _you_ can hit. First pass with Hamish’s gun; any you miss, you try with mine.”

He considered for a moment before picking up Merlin’s gun. “Yeah, okay.”

Daisy set up the rest of the targets and then watched him shoot at them, cheering him on when he hit them. Neither realized they were being watched. Harry had followed them, at a distance, and had stayed out of sight. He had a soft smile on his face, watching Eggsy use a weapon despite believing that he’d be beaten for it if caught; watching him smile and laugh with Daisy, even while he did it so shyly. When he saw them kicking the remains of the cans out of the road, he started back to the campsite. He arrived a few minutes before they did and he could see that Eggsy’s color was high, even though the young man tried to hide it.

“Have fun?” he asked.

“Loads!” Daisy said, returning Merlin’s gun to him.

“Maybe you should make a habit of this. I’m sure you could use the practice,” he said with a glance at Eggsy.

Daisy stuck her tongue out at him. “Maybe I will then.” A thought occurred to her and she grinned. “So that means, when we get to Haven, since it’s a big trading hub, I should get a second gun. Just for practicing with.”

“That sounds like a splendid idea.”

03

“So tell us about Haven,” Harry said when they were about twenty minutes out.

“It’s huge,” Eggsy began. “It was a big city before the War.”

“Huge like Diamond City?” Daisy asked. Diamond City had once been a baseball stadium and was the biggest major settlement in Boston.

“Bigger. Like… the area they all live in is probably the size of Diamond City. Then there’s all the trading places. Swear they got it all. You’ll want Mick for water. He’s the only honest water merchant in the place. The rest _might_ change their filters once in a blue moon, but his’re always clean.”

“Walled?”

Eggsy shook his head. “Nah, just heavy security. There’s the occasional deathclaw attack, but most things have learned to leave Haven the fuck alone. And there’s no starting shit inside the city.”

Harry nodded. “Noted.”

“I’ll be staying with the cart, but I can tell you where everything you need it.”

“What?” Daisy shook her head. “I want you to come shopping with me!”

Eggsy ducked his head, trying hard to not look pleased where Harry could see. “Yeah, but… they ain’t so big on slaves in Haven. We’re a ‘security risk’ and ‘thieves’. So all slaves have to stay wherever their master is trading or in this one sorta cage type area.” He looked up at Harry. “I mean, I can go stay in the cage if you want.”

“No,” Harry said, a bit more sternly than he meant to. He shook his head. “No, you… Stay with the wagon, then.”

“I’ll stay with him,” Cait offered. “Keep him company and an eye on the rest.”

“Hamish and I will go buy what supplies we need. Alistair, why don’t you go shopping with Daisy? Since she’s after a second gun.”

He nodded and cast a quick glance at Eggsy’s hands. He would have prefered to just take Eggsy with them and have him feel the grips and weights until he found something he felt fine with, but he knew Eggsy would panic at the thought. Well, he could always mod the gun later for Eggsy, hopefully without the pretense of it being for Daisy. They could get him something simple, something easily modifiable, something without too much recoil.

When they got into Haven, Eggsy directed Harry to the trading area. He took the yoke off the brahmin and tied her to a post. He started getting boxes out of the cart and setting them up on the display, taking care so that everything they were trading was visible and neat. Harry watched him and, when Eggsy was done, put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed.

“Looks very nice,” he said.

Eggsy ducked his head. “Thank you, Harry,” he said quietly. Fuck, it felt so _good_ when Harry said shit like that to him. He knew he was doing a shit job of hiding it, too, and yet Harry kept on doing it.

“Since you’re stuck here, is there anything you’d like us to get for you?”

Eggsy could _feel_ himself blushing. Fucking Hell, why was Harry being so _good_ to him? All he’d done was set up the display. “No, but thank you for the offer.” The offer was _wonderful_ in and of itself.

“Alright. We’ll be back,” Harry said with a nod to Merlin and they left.

“Shopping!” Daisy said, jumping down from the wagon and grinning at Eggsy. “Sucks that you gotta just stay here.”

He shrugged. “Sorry I can’t go shopping with you.”

“That just means I’m dragging you off at another hub,” she winked and grabbed Alistair by the hand and started all but dragging him toward the other vendors.

He leaned on the display, waiting for people to start coming over and buying. He took care of them when they did, and Cait just watched him for a bit. She hopped down after the first dozen or so people had stopped and leaned against the display.

“You don’t seem ta hate this place.”

Eggsy shook his head. “Nah, it’s… probably the best stop, really.”

“Why’s that?”

He shrugged. “The whole ‘no starting shit’ thing? Applies to beating on slaves. You can beat on ‘em after you leave, but not inside Haven. Usually, Vic ‘n’ Demetre’d forget about the beatings I’d earned unless I _really_ fucked up.”

“So it’s… always been safe here for you.”

He nodded. “Yeah. I mean, I have to stay put but that’s fine. Ain’t like I have caps to spend, yeah?”

“If you didn’t have that collar on, you could do what ya wanted here.”

“Yeah,” he agreed softly.

“Think ya might want to stay here? When we come by again?”

He shook his head. “Nah. I really _do_ want to go back with you.”

“You sure? I remember what it was like when I got free finally. Hunted down the bastards who sold me.” She paused. “Do you remember my talkin’ about that?”

“Vaguely,” he said, frowning a little. “It was your parents, right?”

She nodded. “Yeah. You don’t wanna go after them? The people who sold you?”

Eggsy shrugged. “I kinda… I think the raiders who sold me in the first place? I think they’re dead? I kinda remember something like that…”

She arched her brow. “You remember?”

“Little things… like mum’s face. Someone ruffling my hair at night. A man laughing, probably my dad.” He shook his head. “Just things like that.”

“Anything about your sister?”

He shook his head. “Nah. Well… I remember she was a crying, squirmy lil’ thing. And I know I love her.”

“Just her?”

Eggsy looked at her. “What d’you mean?”

“Don’t you love anyone else?”

Eggsy laughed and shook his head. “No! No, no one. Ain’t plannin’ on it, neither.”

“Why not? Gonna get lonely, don’t you think?”

He shrugged. “Safer. They can’t use it against you if you ain’t feelin’ it.”

“Ah, yeah,” she said and was quiet for a moment. “What about Daisy? You like _her_ , right?”

Eggsy shrugged again. “She’s good to me, same as Harry is.”

“You’ve been spending a lot of time together.”

“Well… her options ain’t exactly big here. She’s got three of her dads, you, and me. I think she just likes having someone who… you know, there ain’t that kinda emotional thing with.”

Cait eyed him for a moment, trying to figure out how honest he was being with her. She knew he thought of himself as property and didn’t understand, really, why Harry was good to him ever. But she also knew that he really believed that people he cared about would be used against him. She didn’t believe that he’d let Daisy secretly teach him to shoot - something that he believed Harry would beat him over - if he didn’t actually care about her. And a great deal, if he was willing to just casually lie about it.

She chuckled and touched his arm before getting back up on the cart and letting him deal with people. By the time the others came back, they had a new pile of things to trade and a couple hundred caps. Eggsy showed Harry everything he’d gotten in trade; some chems, some canned foods, and half a dozen bottles of a drink Harry had never seen before.

“Sunset Sarsaparilla?”

“Yeah, I’ve seen it a couple times. Some Nuka-Cola competitor out west. You can get decent caps for it out here.”

“Or…” Cait said, picking on up, “Six bottles, six of us. We could call it fate and drink ‘em.”

Harry nodded and everyone took one. Everyone except Eggsy. Harry picked up the remaining one and held it out to him. “You’re one of us,” he said gently.

Eggsy took it, with a shy, little grin he didn’t quite try to hide. He drank his silently, dropping the cap in the box. He figured it must be a west thing, but he really liked the taste of the Nuka-cola better. But drinking it made him feel… weirdly good. Probably because of what Harry’d said when he gave it to him.

Harry drank his slowly, tasting it like it was a fancy wine or something like it. Merlin and Alistair shared a knowing look. Because _of course_ Harry liked it. “Eggsy, if you happen across more of these, I would quite like to have them.”

“Sure, I’ll keep an eye out.”

“So… do these weird caps spend like caps?”

Harry looked over at Daisy. “What do you mean?”

She held hers up. There was a huge blue star on the underside. “Well, they’re not Nuka-caps and there’s that star…”

“They spend just as well with most traders, but that blue one’s worth more than the six drinks were,” Eggsy said. “They’re supposed to be the key to some kinda treasure, but you need a _lot_ of ‘em.”

She looked at Harry. “Can I keep it?”

“It was your drink,” he said with a shrug.

She grinned and shoved it in a pocket. “I need another one, too.”

Harry’s brow rose but he nodded. Really, she could have asked for the blue star treasure and he would have been hard-pressed to tell her ‘no’. “If Eggsy finds more bottles, I will personally check each cap for you.” He got into the boxes he and Merlin had brought back. “Oh Eggsy…” He found what he was looking for: a pink box bearing the title ‘fancy lad cakes’. “For you.”

He took them from Harry. “Thank you…”

“I’ll close up the stall for you, and we’ll head out in the morning.” He paused and looked at Daisy. “In the meantime, I think Daisy is anxious to show you her new finds.”

Eggsy nodded and Daisy hopped down from the wagon. She took him over to the other side and they sat against the wagon wheel. She scooted until she was right against him and showed him what she’d gotten ‘for her’. It was a very simple 10mm pistol.

“Alistair thought it would be a good one to practice with.” She grinned at him. “What d’you think?”

He shrugged and held his box of snack cakes to his chest. “I think it looks nice for you,” he said quietly. He was _very_ aware of Harry just a few feet away.

“Well, _obviously_ , it’s for me,” she said with a wink. “But you think it’ll do?”

He looked under the wagon, and could see that Harry was still at the stall. While that didn’t make him much farther away, it meant his attention was elsewhere. Hopefully.

“I think so.”

“We’ll start practicing with it once we’re on the road again. I got Alistair to buy me a bunch of ammo to go with it. He grumbled about it, but his handgun’s a 10 mil, too.”

“He didn’t… think it was weird?”

She shook her head. “Nope, he thinks it’s a good idea, too.” She grinned. They thought _Eggsy_ learning to shoot was a good idea, but she was going to let him keep on thinking otherwise. At least until he was comfortable enough that the truth wouldn’t frighten him.

“I don’t get it. You’re a good shot.”

“Yeah, but they’re all my dads and they all think I’m just a weak little kitten no matter what.”

He laughed softly. “Well… as long as he don’t find out.”

“He won’t,” she promised. “So… what about those cakes?”

He shook his head, tightening his hold on the box a little.

“He got them for you to _eat_ , you know.”

“Yeah, I know. But… it was a gift.” He looked down, grinning shyly. “Ain’t no one given me a gift before. Well… probably mum and dad did, but… I don’t remember it.”

She nodded, understanding. “So it’s… super special.”

She brushed a lock of his hair back and tucked it behind his ear. He was so childlike in some ways, but that was because things like praise and gifts were so new to him. He knew more about the world beyond the Commonwealth than any of them, and he’d been through some serious shit. It was a strange, but sorta adorable, combination. She wondered what he would have been like if they’d grown up together.

“I’m gonna… go help Harry,” he said, getting up.

He hopped up on the sideboard to tuck his box of snacks in his bedroll and left her by the wheel. She waited until he was by Harry and put the box with ‘her’ gun, with his gun, near his bedroll. He’d be able to see it without the worry of being ‘caught’ looking at it.

04

The next two weeks took them through the trading hubs of Yan City, New Ark, and Philli. Yan City was a green-walled city with trade outside the walls; it had been a baseball diamond pre-War. New Ark and Philli had both been pre-War cities. They stood mostly in ruins as, like most cities of pre-War America, they had been heavily shelled.

It wasn’t long before New Ark when they’d started seeing more and more signs of slavery, and more people in collars like Eggsy’s own. Cait was the only one who wasn’t surprised by it. She had learned a long time ago the lesson that was playing out around them; that it wasn’t war, but _humanity_ , that never changed.

Daisy and Eggsy kept up their routine of slipping away every time they stopped for the day, and they’d always come back with at least a dozen of the practice ammo gone. Sometimes Harry followed them, but most of the time, he didn’t. They stayed close enough to camp that he’d hear them if they screamed, and Alistair kept watch. No one was willing to lose either - or both - of them. Not again. But so far, they’d been safe. Eggsy’s aim and speed had been improving, something that delighted Daisy to no end.

“Okay, okay,” she grinned at him. “I’m gonna throw it up in the air.”

Eggsy shook his head. “I’ll _never_ hit that.”

“Try? Please?”

He sighed and tipped his head to the side. She never demanded, never got exasperated. If he told her no, she’d drop it and set up another round of targets for him. And it was _nice_ , being able to say no, even about something like that. But with her, he never _wanted_ to actually say it. He loved how she looked when he tried something harder.

“Okay. I’ll try _one_.”

She let out a happy squeal and bounced. “Okay! Ready?”

She tossed the can up and he shot at it. At, and missed. She caught the can on the way down. “That’s okay! You tried!”

He grinned, laughing softly. “Yeah.”

She went over to the road and sat on a tree stump. “Come sit with me?”

He left the gun with their targets and sat with her. It was a tight fit, but she leaned against him and he put his hand on her shoulder. He leaned his head against hers. It was nice, so _nice_ to just have this sort of thing. To have someone he could show affection to and have it shown to him.

“So,” she began, “I wanna say something. And I don’t want you to take it the wrong way, okay?”

“Okay…”

“I love you.” She paused and looked up at him. “And I don’t mean like… like how Harry loves Hamish. I mean like… like…” She bit her lip.

“Like how Harry loves Alistair?” Platonically, one might even say brotherly, but that was a term both were unwilling to say.

She nodded. “Yeah! Like that. You… I mean… you _get_ that kinda love, right?”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “It just ain’t been something safe for me to feel.”

She watched him for a moment. “Is it… safe now?”

He looked away from her. “No…” He sighed. “I don’t know what I’d do if… if Harry or anyone…”

“They’d have to get past me, and Cait, and Harry, and Hamish, and Alistair first.” She settled back against him for a moment. “We should head back.”

“Already? I only shot five of ‘em.”

She grinned. “I kno-ow.” She hopped up and started back to camp.

He gathered up their stuff and followed her. “What are you up to?”

“Me?” She turned around and gave him her best innocent face. “Who said I’m up to anything?”

He eyed her warily but followed her. She _was_ up to something, and he didn’t like it. While he trusted her, unknown situations had never been a good thing. He slowed when they got to camp, but nothing seemed unusual and he went to the wagon to put away their targets and the gun.

“You have a shirt on under that, don’t you?”

Eggsy startled and winced. He turned around. “What?”

“I’m sorry,” Harry said quickly. “I hadn’t meant to… I’m sorry.”

Eggsy shook his head. “No, I just. Didn’t hear you.”

“You have a shirt on under that.”

Eggsy nodded. “Yeah.”

Harry grinned. “Take it off, would you?”

Eggsy took his outer shirt off and laid it on the side of the wagon. Harry eyed him for a moment before nodding.

“Your belt’s falling apart, do you know that?”

“Yeah. Do you want that next?”

“Do I…” Harry trailed off and then laughed softly. “Oh, I’m not… I’m not trying to make you strip.”

“I don’t mind, Harry.”

“I know,” he said softly. “It’s more to the point that I have a new belt for you.”

“Oh.”

Harry got a box from the wagon and went back over to him. Eggsy opened it and there was, indeed, a belt inside. And something else.

“What’s-”

“Oh, that’s just a thing from Hamish,” Harry said quickly. “Put it on.”

Eggsy, everwilling to do what Harry asked of him, ignored the other piece in the box and took his belt off. He started threading the new one through the belt loops of his trousers. He stopped when he felt Harry’s hand on the small of his back. He didn’t question it; he just let Harry do whatever he was going to do. Which… was apparently just threading it in the back loops for him?

“Anything else?” he asked as he buckled the belt. 

“Mm, just one thing.”

Harry did _something_ and Eggsy didn’t know what; Harry had attached something to him that weighed a bit. It left Eggsy feeling very uneasy because he didn’t know what the fuck Harry was oh-so-cheerfully doing.

“You may put your shirt back on now.”

Eggsy did as he was told, and he watched Harry warily all the while. Once he was dressed again, Harry did a slow circle around him.

“Perfect,” he sighed. “Can’t even tell it’s there.”

“I’m… glad.” He was confused. Very confused.

Harry grinned a little, and impishly. “Why don’t you take a feel at what I did?”

Eggsy felt behind his back. He felt along the belt to the… the _whatever_ Hamish had sent along… and finally felt what Harry had done. His eyes widened. “Harry…”

“Hamish and I thought you should have a proper holster for that gun of yours,” he said. “And I know you’re concerned about being seen as a slave with a weapon. No one will know it’s there.” He put a gentle hand on Eggsy’s shoulder. “We’ve known since she took you to go shooting the first time. You have no idea how happy it makes me that you’re learning.”

“You ain’t angry…?” Eggsy asked, feeling along the grip of the gun. 

“Of course not,” he said with a shake of his head. “We were going to keep pretending to not know, but when we passed through Philli, we realized it’s somewhere in the first week of September. Assuming their dates are right; God knows you need a fucking Pip-Boy to be certain.”

“What’s the date got to do with anything?”

“You were born beginning of September. Ish. Like I said, you need a Pip-Boy to be certain of the date. The others have presents for you, too.” Harry nodded toward the fire, were they’d all settled in.

Eggsy shook his head, not understanding. “Why?”

“Why?” Harry chuckled, slid his hand across Eggsy’s shoulders, and steered him toward the fire. “Because you’re our friend, we care about you.”

“It was an excuse for Harry to be dramatic,” Merlin called to them.

Harry huffed and rolled his eyes. “As if I _need_ an excuse.”

Eggsy looked away and down, grinning, both at being doted on like this and the banter between the two men. He let himself be steered over to the fire. They had chopped up a melon while he and Daisy had been gone; it was cooking over the fire in a mix of water and mashed up Sugar Bombs cereal.

“That,” Alistair said after Eggsy had opened Cait’s gift, “is a silencer. Cuts down your range a little, but not terribly.”

“Thanks…” he said shyly. “I’ve… no idea how to put it on though.”

“I can show you how,” Alistair said, and handed Eggsy his gift. “You can add this at the same time. It’s a mount for a bigger clip. Once you get the hang of it, it’s easy. I have the tools in the wagon. I can show you after…” he looked at the melon cooking, “your birthday… slop?”

“What a _charming_ name for it,” Harry said mildly. “We could call it ‘compote’ like civilized people.”

“Civilization is dead,” Cait said, lifting up the bottle she was drinking from. She nodded at Harry. “Long live civilization.”

Daisy sat on the other side of Eggsy and held out a packet of wrapped cloth. “For you.”

He looked at it and then at her. “So… you ain’t just callin’ the gun my present?”

She shook her head. “It almost was though.”

He unwrapped the cloth. In the center of it was the blue star cap she’d gotten. She’d flattened it, taking care to not score the water-blue star, and had put a pair of holes just above the star. She’d looped some thin lacing through them, turning it into a necklace.

“Daise…”

She grinned and pulled out one from her shirt. “I made us both one. That’s why I wanted two.” Two keys to a lost treasure being turned into necklaces for lost siblings; she’d thought the idea was cute and dramatic, without being nearly as showy as Harry probably would have done.

“Thank you.”

“Alright,” Cait said, interrupting what she thought was about to be a really emotional moment, “let’s break into the compote-slop and figure out which it _really_ oughta be called.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You know, Lynyrd Skynyrd doesn't exist within the Fallout universe, but, somehow, Free Bird was definitely playing in the background while Harry and co. took Paradise Falls to church.

01

They were on the hillside overlooking Paradise Falls, the pre-War strip mall turned slaver city. All told, it had taken them almost forty days to get to the slaver city. The ruins of a fallen overpass gave Alistair cover while he checked out the city.

“Will you be able to hit from here?”

He shrugged at Harry’s question. “Downward trajectory, low wind. But it’s still gotta be two miles. Give me the… yeah.” He took the tripod from Harry and set it up. He adjusted his aim and looked through the scope again. The guards on the catwalks stood out nicely, but the hard part - for him - would be the people on the ground. The angle was shit, but there was no real way for him to get closer without the possibility of being spotted. “Yeah, I should be able to.”

“What do you see?”

“Couple people on catwalks above the city. I can take them no issue.” He moved the rifle a few degrees. “On the ground we have… Woman, older, white. Head mostly shaved. The rest is red and shaped into horns.”

“Carolina Red,” Eggsy said quietly. He could hear the tremble in his voice.

“Man, older, brown. Tight cut.”

Eggsy shook his head. “Could be a couple people.”

“Man, 40s or so, blond, longish.”

“Jotun. He’s a fucking idiot. Swear he’s part super mutant or somethin’. Uses a sledge like they do, too.”

Alistair moved the gun in a wider arc. “I count maybe ten slaves, caged.”

“There’ll be more in the buildings. More guards, too. They’ll come running once the fighting starts.”

“And…” he stopped moving. “There’s another man, off by what I think should be the main house. Older, brown, white hair. Got two women with him.”

“Eulogy,” Eggsy whispered. “The _fuck_ is he doing here?”

“You alright?” Harry asked.

“No. Yes. I.” He shook his head and took a breath. “I’m good. I’m good.”

“Alright. We get through, I’ll try and get them close in. Eggsy’ll signal you when it’s time to start.”

“Understood.”

Harry and Eggsy crept back down the way they’d come, to where Merlin, Cait, and Daisy were waiting with the wagon.

“Status?”

“Guns’re stowed,” Daisy said, leaning on the sideboard. “Hamish has mine and Cait’s guns, his is behind me and Alistair’s handgun is with Cait. We can get to ‘em easy. Everything’s hidden away and we’re ready to be tied up and sold.”

Harry nodded at Eggsy. Eggsy got up in the wagon with them. He started with Cait, wrapping rope around her ankles so that it would look like she was tied well, but would give way once she moved. He was pale and trying to keep his breathing steady. 

“You okay, kid?” she asked, once he started on her wrists.

“Yeah. Good. Fine.” He was not good nor was he fine.

“Hey. Eggsy?” She waited until he looked up at her. “We go in there, we’re killin’ every last one of ‘em. They touch you, we’re killin’ that one slowly. Nothin’ to be scared about. We got you.”

He gave her a shaky smile and went to go ‘tie up’ Daisy. Fuck, he did _not_ want her going in there. Not now, not with both Red _and_ Eulogy to deal with. “Maybe you should stay here.”

“Fuck that,” she snapped. “I want a piece of those fuckers. Besides, gonna look better with a young slave than just miss old lady over there.”

“Fuck you.”

She smiled at Eggsy. “Don’t worry. Nothing’s gonna happen, ‘cept them dyin’. And then we go home. Well, I mean, if you’re still coming with us. But either way, we still all go home after this.”

He nodded. “I am. Going with you, I mean It’s… it’s my home, too, yeah? Or was… or. Something.”

She laughed softly. “ _Is_. It’s still your home.” She waited while he ‘tied’ her hands. “You got your gun, yeah?”

“Yeah. Loaded and ready.” He shook his head. “I still can’t hit the cans you throw. And I never shot anything else. Nothin’ _alive_. I dunno if I can.”

“It’s okay,” she cooed. “It’s just in case. But we’re gonna kill them all before you have to do a fuckin’ thing.”

He nodded. “Yeah. Okay. Right.”

He really wanted Harry to make her stay behind, but he knew she was right. It would be smoother with a younger slave to sell. Just the thought of going back in there, with Red _and_ Eulogy there. It was a lot more difficult than going in with Vic and Demetre. Because he cared if the people he was with were shot, or enslaved, or something worse.

02

Twenty minutes later, they were at the gates of Paradise Falls. They were allowed to pass and Harry, moving purposely slow, led the brahmin inside the city. Merlin followed behind, Cait’s sawed-off in hand and Daisy’s shotgun strapped on his back. The two women kept their heads down, both waiting for the chance to spring and start shooting. Eggsy followed behind Harry, his head down and trying to not show how afraid he was.

Carolina Red was outside the main house when they got there, with Eulogy beside her. The two women with him, both with shaved heads, wore slave collars. Neither of them looked much older than Daisy, and Harry wanted to start shooting.

“Who th’ fuck’re you?” Red sneered at him.

“A man with slaves to sell,” Harry sneered back at her. He looked at Eulogy. “I assume you’re in charge.”

“Fuck that!” Red snapped. “He’s re-fucking-tired. _I_ ’m in charge.”

“Oh, my apologies,” he said with thinly veiled sarcasm. “You didn’t seem to recognize that I’m attempting to supply you with product, so I naturally assumed the more complex end of the business was left to someone more competent.”

She stared at him. She was not smart, and Harry was using big words. Big words that she didn’t know. “Fuck you,” she settled on. “If you’re selling, let’s fuckin’ get to it.”

“Now hold on, Red,” Eulogy interrupted smoothly. “Gary, you haven’t even said hello.”

“Hello, Eu-”

Harry cut him off, bringing his arm back sharply as if he might hit Eggsy. He was sure he’d made Eggsy flinch, and he felt sorry for it, but he wasn’t about to let the slaver touch or order Eggsy around. “This. Is mine.”

Merlin fought the urge to roll his eyes. Harry was _never_ going to let him live that down. Ever. Even while in a near rage that he, with all his years of knowing Harry, could hear perfectly, Harry still had to make his own jokes.

“Oh, and I’ve no issue with that. But I raised him and it does warm my heart to see him again.” Eulogy smiled. He could be charming when he wanted to be. “How about you let me just say hello to him while you and Red talk? Just right here, right with you there.”

Harry looked Eulogy up and down. He knew the fucker was up to _something_ , but he wasn’t sure _what_. He looked back at Merlin and nodded. Merlin climbed up on the wagon, so he could be in a position to watch their ‘captives’ and let Eulogy see the weapons.

Eulogy chuckled. The showing amused him. He and this new slaver were going to have a _nice_ game trying to decide which of them was really in control. “Come here, Gary.”

Eggsy went to him, just as meekly as if he’d never left Paradise Falls.

“You might not have realized this when you bought him…” Eulogy looked pointedly at the wagon and the brahmin “Or… acquired him, but this slave is fine Paradise Falls stock. We break ‘em _right_ , don’t we, Gary?”

“Yes, Eulogy.”

“See, them women you’re-” he paused. “Well, I’ll be. _Cait_. Well, well. So the Irish hellcat’s been leashed again.”

“Interested?”

Eulogy laughed. “Oh, I’ve seen the girl fight; I’d like to see what Red can do to her. The other one, now, that one might be viable to resell. And of course, I’ll be wanting to buy Gary back, too.”

“I think you misheard me before,” Harry all but growled. “ _That_ is _mine_.”

“Oh, I know, he’s such a good little fuck, isn’t he?” Eulogy gave him a knowing smile. “But I only want what’s _best_ for him, and he wants to come home. Don’t you, Gary?”

“...yes, Eulogy.” His voice was barely above a whisper, and he was trembling visibly. Fuck, he wanted a Med-X. Or something. _Anything_ if it made him stop feeling like this. Because he knew what happened when Eulogy shut the charm off. He knew how vicious and brutal Eulogy could be.

“See?”

Harry saw alright. He’d missed just how afraid of Eulogy Eggsy actually was. But he could work around that; it would be fine. Alistair would be watching Eggsy and would see that he’d frozen; he’d start firing on his own at that point. And then he would just have to shoot Red and Eulogy first.

“Well, I suppose we can… negotiate that.”

“Good, good,” Eulogy purred. “Now-”

Whatever he’d been about to say was cut off when one of the guards on the catwalks fell. A second later, another of the guards fell. They took advantage of the slavers’ moment of confusion, and Merlin started shooting at the other guards. Cait and Daisy kicked the ropes off, dove for their guns, and joined in. Harry drew his own gun and shot Red, point blank.

He’d expected no trouble from the two slaves with Eulogy and was surprised when they attacked him. One of them started hitting at him while the other fought with him for his gun. He heard an inarticulate yell behind him and felt something strike him between his shoulders.

He hit the ground and rolled hard, just barely avoiding being hit by the sledge. The blond hefted the sledge again. Harry knew that thing had to be upwards of 30 lbs and all of it in the head. He waited until Jotun had the sledge back for a swing and kicked at his legs, hard. It set the giant off-balance, and gave Harry the time he needed to get his gun back. He rolled on his back and shot Jotun, relieving him of the top half of his head and much unused gray matter.

He more felt than heard a bullet whiz by him and turned, firing at the shooter. All of him that was Harry Hart checked out, and all of the training that had gone into Galahad-turned-Arthur kicked in. He was peripherally aware of the slaves, but as they were cowering or just laying on the ground, he had no real attention for them. They weren’t presenting as threats. He was vaguely aware of Daisy shrieking in anger, but at a glance, she looked unharmed. It was only after, when the fighting had stopped and the slavers dead that Harry realized both of Lee’s kids were gone. Again.

03

“This. is mine.” 

Daisy had to fight to not smirk at that. She knew Merlin would think it was Harry making fun of him, but she knew that wasn’t _all_ it was. Merlin could be, well, possessive. Things, and people, that were his weren’t to be touched. He was a good man, so that came out - in regards to people - as him being very protective of them. Harry was just using that to be the possessive asshole.

And then she saw the old slaver just take complete control of Eggsy, of _her_ brother. She wanted to fucking shoot him, right then and fucking there. It was like all the years between the last time he’d seen his old owner and now just hadn’t happened. She was glad, very fucking glad, that Harry was right there and could blow the motherfucker’s head off once the fighting started.

She heard the first guard fall, and the wet, squishy sound of a head breaking open. Fucking Hell, it was gross. She forced herself to wait and kept her eyes on her hands. She knew if she looked up before it was time, she’d blow what few moments of confusion they had. Then she heard the second guard hit the ground and she kicked the ropes away. She grabbed Merlin’s gun, but the glee from using the plasma weapon was gone and there was just cold fire inside of her. It was a good, if frightening, thing that happened when she fought.

She started shooting at anyone who didn’t have a collar on and wasn’t smart enough to lay the fuck down. She heard a shot to her left and turned, long enough to see that Harry had shot one of the slavers. She turned back to fight and something ticked her brain as wrong. Not just wrong, but flashing neon light _WRONG_.

She fought through the battle haze, trying to think in a place that was solely reflex and training. Harry was there, the dead slaver, cowering slaves. And then it clicked: the old man, his two slaves, and her fucking brother were gone.

She screamed in rage, because she was _not_ running through the fucking woods after another fucker, one who _actually_ meant to hurt him this time. She was _not_ losing him to the fuck who’d done all of this to him in the first place. She jumped off of the wagon and tore off in the only direction they could have gone.

The pathway ended at a house and she shot the lock on the door. She was going to kill every fucking person in the house if she had to. She kicked the door in and made her way inside. The first one she came across was one of Eulogy’s two slaves. She was cowering and crying.

“Where is he?” she snapped.

“I dunno,” the woman whined.

Daisy’s attention had been otherwise occupied and she hadn’t seen the women defending Eulogy. If she had, she likely would have shot the slave and moved on.

“It’s okay,” she said. “Just… stay here and you’ll be alright.”

The slave looked up at her. “You mean it?”

Daisy nodded. “Yeah, just-”

She realized her mistake too late, and the second woman grabbed her from behind. She kicked at the first slave and squirmed in the other’s grip. They fought for the plasma gun and wrested it from her grip.

“You stupid _bitch_ ,” she shrieked.

Said ‘stupid bitch’ struck her with the butt of the gun. “Shut up,” she said colorlessly.

They dragged Daisy, still fighting, into a back room. It took a lot of effort, but they managed to get her tied to a chair. They hadn’t shown any real emotion after they’d grabbed her, and Daisy was aware of it even through her struggling. She wasn’t sure if the slave had been afraid of what Eulogy would do to her or if it had all been an act. And it horrified her that this is what Eggsy had been left to become, what he probably _had_ been, and what she was going to be if she didn’t get out.

04

“Come here, Gary.”

Eggsy had heard almost nothing else since Eulogy had first spoken to him. He’d fallen back into the mindset of belonging to Eulogy without even realizing it had happened. It was something he had learned, and learned well; that when Eulogy speaks, you listen. It was something all of the ones Eulogy paid special attention to learned. Or died.

He was vaguely aware of the two women. He knew he should warn Harry, somehow, that they were Eulogy’s bodyguards. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t bring himself to speak. He could barely even bring himself to think about what he was supposed to be doing (something important), because all that was supposed to matter was Eulogy and what Eulogy wanted of his slaves.

He heard the first guard fall. He knew the sound of the guard’s head breaking open for what it was, and his only thought was that it must have been deserved. He heard the second guard fall, and he more heard than saw Red’s head explode when Harry shot her. And that was good.

He tried to speak, to warn Harry, but then the women - probably renamed Crimson and Clover, the way the last ones had been - fell on Harry. He felt Eulogy’s hand wrap around his wrist and he went, just as meekly as a child, when Eulogy fell back from the fighting. He heard Jotun’s scream and turned in time to see his sledge hit Harry in the back. The new Crimson and Clover left Harry, following Eulogy.

Eggsy lowered his head again. He didn’t think Jotun had killed Harry. If being shot in the stomach hadn’t killed him, then Jotun couldn’t. Harry was like Eulogy in that way; a power too grand and terrifying to actually die. The difference was, to Eggsy, that Harry’s had been a power he had started to feel safe inside of. 

Eulogy led him to a back room and ordered the two women to stop whoever came for them. The left to do as he said, and then those terrible, dark eyes were on him. They were searching him, and fuck, Eggsy wanted to be checked out, to be gone, to feel nothing, and just obey.

Eulogy struck him and he cried out, softly. He waited, trembling, for the next hit.

“Anything you want to tell me, Gary? Before I make you regret being born?”

“No, Eulogy,” he whispered.

“You knew what was going to happen, didn’t you? Didn’t you?”

“Yes, Eulogy.”

The next hit came, hard enough to split his lip. Eggsy could taste the blood but didn’t move to wipe it away.

“Is there anything _else_ you think might save some little scrap of your fucking hide? Because, you mind me, you piece of shit, if I find a single, goddamn thing…”

Eggsy fell back from him and brought out the 10mm from the holster. Eulogy looked between the gun and Eggsy for a moment. He was surprised that Eggsy’d had a weapon on him this entire time but had been too afraid to use it. That was… good, actually.

“What have I taught you about slaves and weapons, Gary?”

“A slave with a weapon is bad for business. A slave who has one deserves to be beaten.”

Eulogy nodded. “Maybe I’ll forget this. Maybe. If you do as I say.” He paused. “You _will_ do as I say, won’t you, Gary.”

“Yes, Eulogy.”

“Clover! Get your ass in here.”

The slave who’d been crying came in. She stood just inside the door, waiting to be ordered around. 

“Shoot her, Gary, and I’ll forget your beating.”

He aimed at Clover, and she didn’t flinch. He was shaking and could feel the trigger under his finger. It would give if he just pulled a little more. But he couldn’t make himself do it, no more than he could have walked out the gate when Eulogy first put the collar on him. He lowered the gun, and his head. He could hear Eulogy laughing, but it didn’t matter. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d been beaten by Eulogy.

“Put the gun down and come with me, Gary.”

He put the gun away, slipping it back into the holster without even thinking about it. He followed Eulogy into another room, where he expected to be beaten within an inch of his life. Instead, Daisy was there. Tied to a chair.

“No,” he whined.

Eulogy ignored him. “Pretty, don’t you think, Clover?”

“Yes, Eulogy.”

“Put a collar on her.”

“Eulogy,” Eggsy shook his head. “No, please. Not her.”

He turned on Eggsy and struck him. “Oh, Gary. Went and got all sweet on some tight cunt, huh? Yeah, I think she’s _definitely_ taking Crimson’s place.”

“Fuck you, you dried up old shit!”

Eulogy laughed. “Do you hear her, Gary? Maybe she _should_ take Clover’s place.”

Clover brought a slave collar to Eulogy and he put it around Daisy’s neck.

“Here’s a little preview of your future, doll,” he said and shot Clover between the eyes; her expression barely even changed. He turned his attention back to Daisy, to his new ‘Clover’. “Do you know fuck all about these collars, Clover?”

“Fuck you!” Daisy spat at him. “My name ain’t fucking Clover!”

“Oh, my dear, you’re going to learn to speak when spoken to.”

He put his hands on the collar to close it… and then the front half of his head was gone. Daisy bit down on the scream that wanted to come from being suddenly doused with blood, and brain, and gore. She shook her head to try and get some of it off of her eyes, and when she opened them, Eggsy was still standing there. His gun was still in his hand, still aimed in her general direction. He was staring at the dead slaver, looking so horrified and so broken.

“Hey,” she said gently. “Eggsy, you can put it down now, yeah? It’s okay now.”

He lowered his arms and the gun fell from his hands. He was shaking and starting to breathe heavily. Daisy wondered if he was going to pass out. She saw the other slave woman, Crimson, and she was staring at Eulogy in the same broken manner. After a moment, Crimson collapsed into a seated position on the floor.

“Eggsy, look at me, okay? Don’t look at him anymore.” She smiled at him when he looked at her. “Hi. Can you come untie me?”

He stared at her for a moment and then went to her, wordlessly. He sank down onto his knees and fumbled with the knots, his hands shaking. He managed to get one of her hands untied before everything he was feeling processed enough that he started crying.

“No, no, no. It’s okay. You did good.” She worked the other knots until she got her hand free. She pulled at the ropes until she was free of them and slid off the chair. She put her hands on his face and made him look at her. “I’m so proud of you.”

He stared at her through his tears for a moment before touching the inactive collar around her neck. He made a weak sound and pushed it off of her before grabbing onto her; he held her so tightly she wasn’t sure she’d be able to breathe. But she didn’t tell him to let go, or struggle against him. She held onto him, letting him cling to her until the crying fit passed.

“I couldn’t…”

“No,” she soothed. “You did just fine.”

“I couldn’t let him…”

“You didn’t. You stopped him. You saved me.”

He pulled away from her enough to look at her. He was still breathing hard. He touched the blood on her face and then looked at Eulogy’s body.

“Fuck me, I killed him.” The words were little more than a horrified whisper.

She stared up at him, not understanding at first. He should be happy that he killed Eulogy, shouldn’t he? But then she looked at the way Crimson was just… staring at him, and at poor dead Clover who hadn’t even flinched when he’d shot her. He didn’t just break them; he brainwashed them. And, despite being loath to admit it, she knew Eulogy had basically raised him.

“It’s okay, Eggsy,” she whispered. “Look at me, not him, okay?” She smiled gently when he looked at her. “Let’s go, okay? We’ll go find Harry and Harry’ll make everything okay.”

“Harry won’t be mad…?”

She smiled a little more. “What, that you shot Eulogy? Fuck no, he’ll be _super_ pleased.”

“Okay…”

She helped him to his feet but he wouldn’t let go of her. It was almost as if he _couldn’t_ let go, as if she was somehow keeping him from drowning on dry land. She shifted in his grip, so she could walk and he could still keep her tightly clutched.

She got them back to the wagon. Merlin and Cait were getting the slaves gathered together. She knew Alistair couldn’t be too far out. He would have been able to take a more direct route to the city than they’d taken with the wagon. Once she had Eggsy over to them, Merlin yelled for Harry. 

Harry, who had been systematically searching buildings for them, appeared almost instantly. He saw Eggsy, pale and trembling, and Daisy, covered in blood. He, of course, assumed the worst and rushed to them. He only realized how very shaken Eggsy was when he tried to touch Daisy and Eggsy all but snapped her away from him. Harry did nothing for a moment, because he could see that Eggsy was keeping himself between them.

“Eggsy, I just want to look at her. I want to make sure she’s not hurt.”

“I’m okay,” she said quietly. “It’s not my blood. It’s that fucker’s blood. Eggsy killed him.”

“Eggsy?” Harry asked, putting a tentative hand on his shoulder.

Eggsy shied away from the hand and tensed. When no blow came, he looked up at Harry, looking so lost and so unsure. Harry gently guided him close and held onto him. It was a few moments before he loosened his grip on Daisy and grabbed onto Harry with one arm. 

Harry looked over Eggsy’s shoulder and mouthed the word ‘blanket’ at Merlin. Merlin brought one over and wrapped it around Eggsy. He helped Harry get Eggsy shuffled over to the wagon and then sitting against the wheel of it.

“Is it alright if Daisy helps Hamish and Cait?”

Eggsy looked up at him and then at Daisy. He opened his mouth to say something and then just lay his head against Harry’s chest again. Harry nodded at Daisy and she tried to move out from his hold. Eggsy let go of her once she started moving and she touched his hair as she got to her feet.

“I think he’s mostly in shock,” Harry said quietly.

“Fucker tried to put a collar on me. I don’t think either of them thought… Eggsy would actually shoot him.”

“I’m glad he did,” Harry said. “I’ll stay with him.”

05

Even with Alistair, it took them the better part of an hour to go through all of the buildings of Paradise City and find the last few hiding slaves. They went through all of the boxes and crates, taking everything of value and bringing it back to the wagon. They kept it separate from their own supplies, keeping things piled by general categories. After they had everything set, they went around to all the guard and slaver bodies, taking anything off of them that seemed useful, especially their weapons. 

All told, there were twenty-three slaves, thirteen of them adults. There weren’t enough weapons for each adult, but Harry had seen the ways they’d been grouping themselves. There would be enough for each group to be decently armed. That was, once they could leave.

“We’ve found what we believe will deactivate your collars, but we’ve never dealt with this particular system before.” Harry looked around at them. “I need a volunteer who is willing to let me make the attempt to deactivate and remove their collar. Once it’s off, you’re free to go if you like, or return with us to the Commonwealth.”

“How about,” one of the younger men snapped, “you use your own fucking slave.”

“He ain’t been here long,” an older one said. “That slave a’ his is Gary. Gary’s collar’s set so if it goes off, _we_ die, not him. Gary don’t care about his own self. Just others.”

“Exactly why I would like to be certain before taking his off.”

The older slave shrugged. “What the fuck? At least it’ll be quick. I’ll do it.”

Harry led him into the main house, and to where the electronic systems were. It took him, with Cait and Merlin, the better part of twenty minutes before they were certain about what they were doing. Once they thought they had it, they keyed in the command to shut off the collar. Harry opened it and was pleasantly relieved when the collar just popped open without killing the slave.

“There you go,” Harry said. “As I said, you’re free to leave if you like. Have someone else come up. I’d like it one at a time, so we can be certain we’re deactivating the correct collar each time.”

The slave looked Harry up and down. “You’re just gonna have that sniper of yours kill me.”

“No, he ain’t,” Cait said. “But you go on and tell the others to start coming up. You’ll see Harry’s a man of his word.”

He rubbed his neck, touching the part of it that hadn’t seen the sun in _years_. “Alright. Yeah. Sure.” He walked away from Harry, paused at the door to look back at this stranger who’d just freed him, and then out. He was still touching his neck when he got outside again and he stopped where the slaves were. “He. He really did it. He wants everyone to go up, one at a time, and he’ll… he’ll take the rest off.”

“Yeah?” one of the women challenged. “And then what? He shoots us all? Or just leaves us here without a fucking thing for the next fucker who comes through?”

“You _may_ have noticed,” Alistair yelled over the starting din. He waited until they were all looking at him. “We kept everything we got off of them seperate. Those of you who want to leave? We’ll outfit you as best we can. We are not doing it until we know who’s leaving, however, because there’s simply not enough to go around.” He paused. “Now, I don’t know what it’s like around here, but we have a settlement. There’s food, there’s water, there’s fucking _walls_ to keep out fucks like these.” He motioned to the dead bodies. “It’s also a month north of here. So go do like Harry said so you can get the fucking collars off, and we can all get out of here before the next fucker comes through.”

Alistair turned away from them before they could start arguing with them. Some of them were spirited still; that was a good sign if they were staying in the Wasteland. Good fucking name for it, too. He’d be happy to be back up north, where the trees were alive and green.

He dug into their supplies, found a bottle of water, and went to sit with Eggsy. He opened it and held it out to the young man. Eggsy had been mostly unresponsive since Daisy had brought him back. He’d seen it happen a couple times with synths they’d freed. That first real fight, where they had to kill someone or die, where that someone was a known person… It was hard enough on the freed slave without the fucked up relationship that had existed with Eggsy and his captor.

He waited, just holding the bottle patiently, until Eggsy took it from him. “Hope you weren’t expecting Daisy to leave you alone ever now,” he said while Eggsy slowly drank. “She is going to tell every person in Zimonja how you saved her from that piece of shit. Girl’s got a big mouth.”

Eggsy finished his drink and just held the partially empty bottle. It had become the new focal point for his attention.

“I understand that you’re scared. You would have been in some serious shit, right?” He paused, not expecting an answer but leaving enough time for Eggsy _to_ answer. And then he went on as if Eggsy had. “Yeah, so wanting to hide like you are? It’s completely understandable.” He leaned toward Eggsy and lowered his voice. “I know we’re not supposed to bring it up, because Harry wants you to decide on your own and all that shit. But you’re _family_. We protect each other.”

He heard Eggsy make a soft sound and saw him look away and down. He smiled a bit to himself. He didn’t know if the fancy Vault doctors would agree with his methods, but talking like this to people in Eggsy’s sort of shock seemed to help.

“No need to thank me,” he said. “It’s simply the truth.”

He saw movement out of the corner of his eye and looked over. The older slave had made his way over to them. He looked jumpy, something Alistair didn’t blame him for.

“Decide what you’re doing?”

He shook his head. “I wanna know what’s happening to Gary.”

“Well,” Alistair began, “he blew Eulogy’s head off and he’s still in shock. But he’ll be alright.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I wanna know what you’re gonna do with him. I ain’t stupid; I know he took a lot of shit to keep us all alive.” He nodded toward the slaves. “I know some a' them resent him for it, like he had any choice in the matter, but… I don’t. I was here when Eulogy told him he could leave, but it just meant he’d be killing us all.”

Alistair nodded, understanding both what he was being asked this time and a bit more about their fucked up captor/slave relationship. “His father was one of us. He’d expressed a desire to return with us. But if he wants to stay here, then he stays. He’s as free to choose as the lot of you.”

“I can sit with him,” he offered. “I’m sure you’ve got things you need to do and...” He shrugged. “I gotta wait until you’re ready to leave anyway. If I’m gonna go with.”

“I think you have another fan,” Alistair winked at Eggsy before getting up. “Let one of us know if he needs something.”

He sat with Eggsy and waited until the sniper was gone. “If you wanna stay, I’ll stay with you. Ain’t gonna lie, Gary; I’m going with ‘em cos you are. If you think they’re trustworthy, then they are.”

Eggsy looked over at him after a moment. “Eggsy,” he said softly.

“What?”

“I don’t think I like ‘Gary’ anymore.”

The older freed slave smiled a bit. “I can dig it. Eggsy, then.”

06

It was slow going for Merlin and Cait. They didn’t want to risk deactivating and removing the wrong collar, and they couldn’t figure out how to just deactivate them en masse. Every time they tried, they just came back online. Merlin figured it was a safeguard to keep the slaves from revolting; it made sense enough.

After what felt like hours (and likely _was_ ), Merlin sat back and cracked his spine. It gave three loud pops that felt _marvelous_. “One left,” he told Harry. “Just Eggsy.”

Harry nodded. He’d both been looking forward to this and not looking forward to it. He remembered all too well how Eggsy had been at first, how afraid that trying to take the collar off was a trick. And that had been _after_ being away from Eulogy for some time. He went down to where Eggsy and his friend were still sitting against the wheel.

“Down to you now,” he told Eggsy quietly. “We won’t leave until we can take yours off, but no one is going to force you to go. We’ll stay as long as you need. And you can take a look around if you want, check and make sure we didn’t miss anyone. You can look at the main controller and see that they’re all inactive, too. Whatever you need.”

Eggsy got up, moving slowly and holding the blanket around himself. He still wanted to hide inside his own mind - it felt safer than being present - but this was Harry. Harry, who had never hit him, never hurt him, always made sure he felt safe. Harry, who had been _happy_ that he’d been learning to shoot. He looked up at Harry adoringly. It rose in him to protest, to tell Harry that he didn’t mind staying Harry’s slave. But he was starting to understand that Harry _really and truly_ didn’t want that.

He looked around, slowly counting everyone. There had been twenty-three people in slave collars; now there were twenty-three people milling around in groups and looking unsure. Harry really had set everyone free. Just like he promised.

He looked back at Harry and nodded. Harry held a hand out for Eggsy to come along and Eggsy went to him. Harry put the offered hand on his shoulder and walked with him up to the main house. He saw Merlin and Cait waiting for him and looked down shyly.

“You ready, kid?” Cait asked him.

“Yeah,” he said quietly.

“Hey, look who’s talking again,” Merlin teased gently. “There’s only one more light on the board, but we’re still goin’ ta triple check before we take it off. Just to be certain.”

Harry pulled the blanket away from Eggsy’s neck and read off the serial number on the collar. Merlin read it back to him and keyed in the commands to deactivate it. It asked him to verify three times that he wanted it shut down before it accepted his command. The light on the main controller blinked out and Merlin checked in the computer that it was inactive.

“Good to go,” he told them.

Harry put his hands on the collar and met Eggsy’s eyes. “You’re alright?”

Eggsy shuddered but nodded. The idea of taking the collar off was terrifying. “Much as I will be.”

Harry unlatched it and gently took it off of him. He more felt than heard it ripping the outer layer of Eggsy’s skin in places. He gently prodded at Eggsy’s neck, where the skin was so pale from years of being covered up. He could see, very clearly, where the edges of the collar had chafed his skin, healed, and chafed again. It was where the skin had started to actually bond to the fucking thing.

He took Eggsy’s hand and put it on his neck, letting him feel where the collar no longer was. “It’s gone,” he told him.

Eggsy felt his neck for a few moments, feeling the scarring from the years of chafing, and pressed against Harry, hiding his face against the older man’s chest. Harry held onto him and nodded at the door. Merlin and Cait left them alone, as much for Eggsy as for the twenty-three people waiting to either be outfitted and sent on their way, or loaded up to head up north.

“I’ll still do anything you ever ask,” Eggsy said after a while.

“I know you think you owe it to me, but you really don’t. We lost you because I didn’t realize raiders had cut into our fences.”

“Yeah, well,” he looked up at Harry shyly. “I think… it’s okay to trust you. You ain’t never taken advantage of anything I ever offered. You ain’t never threatened to hurt Daisy to keep me in line.”

Harry laughed softly. “Eggsy, if I had been so inclined, you were willing to do anything for me. I would have hardly needed to threaten her.”

Eggsy frowned a little and thought about it. “Well… yeah. I guess.”

“Why don’t we,” he started as he slid one arm up to Eggsy’s shoulders and turned him toward the door, “head on down and get the fuck out of here?”

He smiled up at Harry. “Yeah, let’s get going.”

07

Of the twenty-three freed slaves, only eight decided to go with Harry and the others. Four of them were sixteen-year-olds fresh from Little Lamplight, the all child settlement that kicked people out on their sixteenth birthday. One was Eggsy’s friend, named Mikhael. The other three were an adult woman and the two small children that she’d mostly adopted since they’d been captured. 

They helped themselves to a wagon and one of the slavers’ brahmin to transport the eight new people. As they’d promised, they outfitted the others with the weapons and supplies they’d found in Paradise Falls. Harry gave them some of the stimpaks from their own supplies, too. He had a feeling they’d need them more than his little caravan would. 

Harry did one last thing before they set out. He went back into the main house and gathered all the collars together with the main control device, and set fire to it. He heard the explosives in the collars blowing as he left, and had a feeling that all of Paradise Falls would end up burning. It would be no great loss, and it would keep twenty-three people safe in the future.

Daisy wouldn’t let Eggsy walk the first shift. She made him settle in the wagon and she settled in with him. She got him one of her dwindling cans of peaches (she’d left most of them behind in the Commonwealth) and made him eat.

“So, um…” She paused, taking the can from him and adding it to their target collection. “I wasn’t entirely honest with you about a couple things. And… well… I wanna come clean.”

He nodded, a little relieved. He’d wondered when she’d bring it up. Although he wasn’t sure what she meant by a ‘couple’ things. “What is it?”

“Me and Cait ain’t a thing,” she said. “So… Harry wouldn’t have known about it. So it wasn’t a lie, exactly.”

He eyed her for a moment. “Why not just… tell me?”

“Because… it gave us a secret. Something we had that Harry didn’t. I thought…” she shrugged. “It might help you be comfortable.”

He laughed softly. “Well… I guess it worked.”

“Yeah… but. I wasn’t really happy lying to you. Even if it wasn’t exactly lying.”

“It’s fine,” he said, putting an arm around her. “Hardly the worst thing anyone’s ever done, and… you did it for a good reason.”

She settled against him. “The… other thing. Well, you’re coming with us, right?”

“Yep. Decided that back in Be’ton.”

She looked up at him. “What made you decide?”

“Well... there was Harry. I mean, the lot of you, but Harry was… Dave wasn’t wrong when he said I was loyal to Harry. He’s… always been so good to me.” He looked down at her and winked. “And then there was you breaking down in the bunker.”

She bit her lip and grinned. “I was emotionally compromised,” she said in the same prim tone Harry occasionally used.

“Yeah, I know,” he paused. “So you don’t actually have to say it.”

She frowned. “Say what?”

“That you’re my little sister. That I didn’t get you killed.”

She pushed away from him. “How in the fuck did you know?”

He smirked at her. “You called him ‘dad’. Not ‘Eggsy’s dad’. Not ‘Lee’. You called him ‘dad’.”

“I did no such thing!”

“‘You were just trying to pay dad back’. Your exact words. _Believe_ me, they stuck with me.”

She looked away from him, a number of emotions playing on her face. “Then… you’re only staying because of that? That’s what Harry didn’t want.”

“Oh, fuck that,” he said and pulled her back against him. “You lot are the only real home I’ve ever had. Well, that I remember. It ain’t just knowing who you are. Promise.”

She sighed and lay against him for a few minutes. “God, you’re a shit,” she muttered. “My big, dramatic, worthy of being like Harry moment… and you just…”

He grinned at her. “Outdid you?”

“Yeah.”

“I guess Harry taught us both well.”

She chuckled and closed her eyes. Soon they were both sleeping in the back of the wagon. Harry didn’t wake them when they stopped for their midday break. Instead, he got on the sideboard and watched them sleep.

He’d heard enough of their talk to know that Eggsy had known about Daisy for a rather considerable amount of time. It gave him a bit of insight as to why Eggsy had gotten so physically affectionate toward her, and why he’d never acted toward her the way he did toward Harry. And why Eggsy had been able to find it in himself to kill Eulogy. That, alone, was worth the possibility that Eggsy might have only stayed because of Daisy and not because he’d wanted to. It would help him heal, help him find himself again, and maybe even help some of that feisty spirit he’d had so long ago come back.


End file.
